Fujisawa Enoshima Fireworks Festival results in one ton of garbage strewn on the beach

Shocked net users lament the beachside paradise littered with garbage–an uncommon occurrence in usually tidy Japan.  

When the people of Tokyo need to escape, one popular day-trip getaway is seaside Fujisawa City in neighboring Kanagawa Prefecture. Easily accessible from the nation’s capital, its long shoreline entices surfers and beachgoers alike for a few hours of frolicking outside of the hustle and bustle of city life (and perhaps to also try some yummy anchovy pancakes). Not far from Katase-Enoshima Station is a bridge that connects the mainland to Enoshima, a small island which boasts a lighthouse, aquarium, multiple shrines, delicious seafood, and on the far side, sea caves and tidal pools to explore. While Enoshima is quite popular for its natural beauty among both locals and tourists, the area is unfortunately receiving negative attention at the moment due to thoughtlessness on the part of its human visitors.

The annual Fujisawa Enoshima Fireworks Festival was held on the evening of Saturday, October 20. While this year’s festival was predicted to involve rainy weather, the main event proceeded as planned, unlike last year’s show that eventually had to be canceled. Around 85,000 people were expected to attend and enjoy the spectacle, and enjoy it they did–a little too much, in fact, because they also somehow managed to forget their civic duty to clean up after themselves.

Check out the following photo that Twitter user @Rinado_ob posted in the aftermath of the festival, which subsequently went viral on Japanese new sites: 

“Enoshima. These were Japanese people.

At this rate, next year’s fireworks festival won’t be held.”

Notice how she specifically comments that her fellow citizens were responsible for the mess. Time and time again, Japanese people have garnered an international reputation for cleaning up after themselves no matter the venue or the circumstances–even inspiring others to do the same. Therefore, part of the shock behind this photo lies in the sharp contrast to the usual image of Japanese people leaving behind pristine surroundings.

While many families probably left the fireworks early due to the rain, it’s worth noting that event organizers blasted multiple announcements both before and after the show for spectators to either take their trash with them or drop it off at one of the specified collection stations. Despite those requests, Fujisawa City’s Tourist Association reports that one ton of garbage was left on the beach this year, which is a staggering three times the amount as at the last festival. One of the most common items left behind were tarps for sitting on. At the very least, the Association does report that 150 kilograms (331 pounds) of garbage was properly disposed of at the collection sites, which is twice as much as the previous time.

Net users responded to the scene with disgust, particularly drawing attention to the disconnect between such a beautiful event and unsightly waste and musing on the future of the event as well:

“After such beautiful fireworks, this is just sad.”

“On top of opposing the Olympics itself, I’m also worried about my beloved Enoshima, which is set to host some of the events. I’m praying that the island won’t be impacted during and after the games.”

“If children see adults behaving in this way, they’ll think that they can just litter wherever they want.”

“What a disgrace. They’re better off not holding the fireworks if it’s going to end in nothing but environmental pollution.”

“Is this seriously for real? I wish people who do this kind of thing wouldn’t come to Enoshima at all. But I actually wouldn’t mind if the Enoshima Fireworks Festival ended because of this. It’s not even the main fireworks festival around here, after all.”

On a final note, event organizers had anticipated a certain amount of trash to be left behind and already had plans for a cleanup event the following morning. Volunteers who participated for an hour and a half and then displayed the most “interesting” trash that they found in front of an audience were eligible to win a prize. Even so, let’s hope that the fireworks festival, if indeed held next year, will result in a significantly smaller amount of garbage than expected.

Source: Twitter/@Rinado_ob, Biglobe News
Featured image: Twitter/@Rinado_ob



Credit:

Businesses If Horror Movies Were Real





Credit:

I Hate Scary Movies

Why would you not want to be terrified?! What else are you going to watch, videos of people hugging?

I Hate Scary Movies


Credit:

Criminally studious Japanese schoolgirl caught stealing dozens of educational books in one night

Educators might applaud her motivation, but the police arrested her anyway.

It’s been a busy couple of days for police in Japan, with rowdy Halloween street parties in Tokyo leading to at least five arrests for offences including groping and assault. But it’s not just downtown nightlife districts where criminals were apprehended this week, as a bookstore in Hyogo Prefecture was also the scene of a crime.

On the evening of October 29, an 18-year-old high school girl walked into the bookstore in front of JR Akashi Station. After some extensive browsing, she left without purchasing anything, but later returned to the store for her second visit between the hours of 7 and 8 p.m.

This time, something about the way she was moving about the store struck one of the employees as suspicious. When the staff approached the schoolgirl and examined her bag, they found it filled with books that she was attempting to steal. The police were summoned, and the subsequent investigation revealed that she’d already made off with 10 books from her first trip to the store that night, and in total had attempted to steal 25.

So just what sort of ill-gotten goods was the girl after? Manga, like the middle schooler who was arrested as part of a two-person thievery team at another Hyogo bookstore earlier this year? Smutty magazines she was too embarrassed to carry up to the register?

Nope. Among the books she’d stolen was one titled An Interesting and Easy to Understand Explanation of Exponents and Logarithms, and that was pretty much representative of the rest of her haul. All 25 books she’d taken were study-aids and educational reference books. It’s not like she was planning to resell them at discounted, yet to her pure-profit, prices to her peers, either. When the police arrived and questioned her, she not only admitted to having stolen the books, but said her intent was to use them herself to study with, and that she’d taken them because she doesn’t have the money to buy them with.

While her level of academic enthusiasm is admirable, the total cost of the books she’d taken comes to roughly 36,000 yen (US$320), which is beyond what Japanese society is generally willing to write off as an acceptable bending of the law by teenagers. The girl was formally arrested on October 30, and while punishment is yet to be handed down, hopefully any court-ordered rehabilitation process will include an orientation at her local public library.

Source: Kobe Shimbun Next via Hachima Kiko
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert image: Pakutaso



Credit:

We take a 100-yen MP3 player for a test drive, live to tell the tale

What’s the lowest you’ve ever paid for a piece of tech? Our Japanese-language reporter Seiji might have you beat.

Isn’t it great to have all the technological wonders of the world at your fingertips? With the advances in audio technology, we are able to listen to the latest hit songs with just the press of a button! That button can even be on your phone! In fact, it most likely is! The world has come a long way since the clunky personal Walkman cassette and CD players everyone used to tote around, and because of the convenience of phones some people don’t even have a dedicated MP3 player anymore.

Whether you use a phone or dedicated device, the ease with which you can purchase songs in data format means they’re the number-one way to listen to music these days. You can peruse various sizes and shapes of portable music players online or in stores, but our Japanese-language reporter Seiji Nakazawa decided to filter results on Amazon by price and investigate the cheapest possible model, priced at a meagre 100 yen (US$0.90).

Would a 100-yen player even work? Who even heard of an MP3 player costing less than a pair of discount underwear? Seiji’s suspicions only mounted further as he read the instructions, which were in a very unusual brand of Japanese.

▼ “By simply copy/pasting files from your computer to the MP3 device, your preparations are ready.”

Other confusing missives inform customers that the device “is bolstered by 8GB Micro SD / TF cards (memory not included)” in the listed features while boasting “can be used with Micro SD and TF cards” in other descriptive text, leading to a lot of confusion. It definitely seems like the specifics were written in someone’s second language.

But who’s complaining? It’s 100 yen!

Seiji quickly decided that the best way to understand the secrets of this MP3 player would be to purchase it, and that is exactly what he did.

▼ Ordered on October 9, with a tentative delivery date of October 21

Twelve day delivery, eh? Seiji figured it was the price you paid for a 100-yen MP3 player (in addition to shipping, which cost significantly more than the player itself). But of course it wasn’t that easy. Is it ever?

▼ “We’re terribly sorry, but it will take a little longer for your item to be delivered.”

Finally, on the 25th, a special package arrived! It took so long to arrive that Seiji didn’t remember what he’d ordered. Whether the delay was due to a problem with the supplier or the mail, Seiji chalked it up to being a inevitability of discount tech.

▼　Something from Taiwan…?

After tearing off the wrappings, Seiji found an actual MP3 player inside. What a relief!

▼ A really tiny, actual MP3 player!

Seriously though, is this an MP3 player for dolls? It looks like a single sleeping bag in a huge conference room.

▼ It’s more thumb-sized than palm-sized.

Anyway, time to connect it to the computer… oh.

The package came with nothing but the tiny MP3 player itself: no cords, no cables, no cards (they warned us about that last one, sort of). To test it out Seiji would need to use a Mini-B USB cable, which he did not own. Off to the electrical goods store!

▼　518 yen.

Upon returning home, Seiji noted that the MP3 player didn’t have any internal memory (what with it being a 100-yen product and all). Sigh. Time to rush back to the store to buy a memory card, too.

▼ 1,058 yen.

This 100-yen MP3 player was getting expensive.

Finally, he could load music onto this contraption! Seiji slotted the card inside the player and hooked it up to his PC.

▼ A folder appeared!

As he copied music files into the MP3 player’s home folder, Seiji reminisced about his old personal Walkman CD player from his junior high school days. That thing sure did skip and glitch out whenever you took a step, haha! Sweet memories. Oh, the data all transferred.

▼ “Considering it was an MP3 player I bought for 100 yen, I was impressed the data transferred at all.” – Seiji

The moment of truth…

▼ Time to face the music.

The interface on the device is pretty simple, with just two functions – music and settings. The buttons to skip forward and back on the left and right of the click-wheel serve as navigation buttons, and the ‘M’ button at the top is used to confirm.

▼ Seiji promptly set the language to English, because the only other option was Chinese

Settings lets you adjust the contrast of the screen, how long the screen is backlit for, and also the language. Moving on to the music itself…

With a simple click of his thumb, music began to play! It didn’t have any kind of list to select from, and skipping just took you to the next song in the folder. Basically what you would expect from a 100-yen MP3 player.

The VOL button at the bottom of the click wheel allows for a rudimentary way to change the volume, and the sound quality from the device itself wasn’t bad. A perfectly adequate way to listen to music, so long as you don’t need bells and whistles like “a playlist” or “the ability to select a song”.

▼ Seiji gives himself over to the beat

But guess what? This little MP3 player has another hidden feature! Tap the “M” button while playing music and you can cycle through a list of equalizers to better customize your listening experience. The four options are “POP”, “ROC”, “JAZ” and “CLA”, and Seiji thoughtfully reviewed the sound quality of each of them for us here. Expecting a graphic equalizer would be a bit much for a discount device, don’t you think?

  • POP: Makes you feel like your entire body is vibrating
  • ROC: Imbues music with the muddy mid-tones you hear when speaking with your nose pinched
  • JAZ: Like listening to something filtered through a radio speaker
  • CLA: Boosts the bass a bunch

…So kind of pointless, then. Seiji just set it back to “NOR”, which is the setting for no equalizer effects.

Seiji’s verdict was absolute:

“This MP3 player is so useless it kind of loops back to being adorable. Not only is it super basic in form and function, but it has this completely useless equalizing function that no one would ever use. If you had to add a function, why not use something useful like a song list?”

It was decided that the little mp3 player would live out its days on Seiji’s desk, gathering dust. He left us with a word of caution: while this adorable little player might seem tempting, you should remember that it comes without any accessories. In total Seiji spent 1,975 yen, what with shipping and various add-ons. If you’re seeking a no-frills cheap mp3 player it might be more worthwhile to track down an 8GB player with the memory card already included.

Still though, if you already had the accessories lying around, that’s essentially just 100 yen for an MP3 player! Amazing, right? That’s a way better purchase than some similarly cheap investments we could name.

Images © SoraNews24



Credit:

Mysterious ghostly baby footprint randomly appears in shopping malls, creeps out netizens

Beware the phantom baby that haunts shopping centers in the Philippines.

We tend to think of apparitions and spirits as ethereal beings lurking around decrepit buildings or old shrines at night, but ghosts have been known to be encountered just about anywhere.

And in the city of Balanga, Philippines, a phantom has apparently been roaming certain shopping malls for years. According to Filipino Twitter user @kyuriiie, the buildings in question are Galeria Victoria Mall, Ocampo’s Ali Mall, Central Plaza Mall, and Vista Malls.

▼ @kyuriiie says single baby footprints (only the left) have been spotted at these locations.

▼ No one knows if it is malicious or not (rough translation below).

“And it’s just one footprint with no pair. The prints are sometimes muddy, greasy, and even bloody. The left footprint appears in the shopping mall and at a different store each night.”

What’s more, @kyuriiie claims the toddler’s footprints are occasionally accompanied by an adult’s, and wiping away the left imprint will apparently cause the right one to appear. Some store owners have even considered it to be a sign of good luck if the infant has visited their shop. But pictures are worth a thousand words, and @kyuriiie has plenty to show from Facebook.

▼ Muddy in most of the pictures, and oily in the bottom right.

▼ This Facebook user reckons the phantom is a one or two year old baby.

▼ Other netizens have also seen the footprints, although this particular one had six toes.

▼ One netizen’s sister has stories to tell.

“My sister has been a manager at Vetafs for almost a decade now. She has heard about the child footprints and the long stories associated with them. Some customers have even seen the toddler.”

▼ And it continues…

“There was one story where a customer exclaimed ‘What are you doing?’ at an empty chair. According to him, a child was sitting beside his legs and his knees were bent in an awkward position. Creepy.”

While some netizens were skeptical about the entire ghostly affair, @kyuriiie insists that children would not enter malls with such dirty feet, and that security guards at Vista Malls would not allow street children to enter the premises.

Someone ought to send a ghostbuster down to check out this phantom baby, and while they’re at it, maybe they can swing by some of Japan’s extremely haunted places too.

Source: Twitter/@kyuriiie via INQPOP!
Featured image: Twitter/@mark_estavillo



Credit:

Japanese YouTuber seeking last minute hotel lodgings finds room for one that “might be a bit big”

CEO of virtual YouTuber agency found himself sleeping in a cavernous room that dwarfed his tiny bed, to the delight of netizens.

In the hustle and bustle of moving around Japan, there are times when you might be caught out without a hotel. Thankfully, Japan is one of the better places to be stranded without lodgings if you’re in a big city. Call around enough and you’ll be sure to find a capsule hotel, a themed rest area or even a comfy manga cafe to rest your head in.

Daichi Tsukamoto, the CEO of Nagoya-based corporation DUO, was in one such pickle while traveling through Osaka. After frantic calls around the area he did find somewhere to lay himself down, although the dimensions of the room he ended up staying in were a tad unorthodox.

Tsukamoto tweeted:

“I was traveling to Osaka and realized at the last moment that I’d forgotten to book a hotel. I called hotel after hotel, but they were all full on the Saturday night I needed a room…

But one lone hotel gave me this answer: “We have one Japanese-style room available, though it may prove to be
a little spacious for the needs of one customer on their own.”

I checked in and here we are.”

Clearly this room is ordinarily intended for a huge party of guests, maybe while furnished with a long table in the middle so that everyone can confer face to face. Tsukamoto’s small futon, made up for a single person, looks comically out-sized by the gigantic room around it. What is this, a hotel room for a giant?

As animators and illustrators sometimes struggle with realistic perspective for rooms, it was the perfect time to make some jokes at their expense.

▼ “Reminds me of Yu-Gi-Oh!“

Another commenter recognized the room configuration from their youth!

▼ “You know, back in elementary and junior high school, we had a name for a big room with no dividing walls or doors, with that exact brand of tile flooring. We called it a multi-purpose hall. You stayed in a multi-purpose hall.”

Other highlights ran the gamut from disbelief at the hotel’s underselling of the room’s size to suggestions for how to use the space.

“You could throw a hell of a party in there.”
“Sure, ‘a little’ spacious.”
“This photo just makes me feel like I was the first one to hear the evacuation order and got into the emergency hall first…”
“It’s just a conference room!”
“Where’s the toilet? The TV? The bathing facilities?”

Maybe Tsukamoto could have livened all that dead space up by inviting some of his virtual YouTuber talent to come spend the time with him. His agency Entum does include Mirai Akari, a popular virtual idol designed by the artist of Hatsune Miku, so she could probably draw enough fans and friends to fill that room up.

Let this be a lesson to all of us going forward: if you want to avoid staying in a gargantuan conference room, make sure to book your hotel or ryokan room well in advance!

Source: Twitter/@daichi_duo via Hachima Kikou
Featured image: Pakutaso



Credit:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)