Twentythree

Now there’s even more to be thankful to Thanko for.

Japanese gadget maker Thanko has repeatedly shown its knack for innovations to be grateful for, but the company’s best idea of all is arguably its One-Person Rice Cooker Series. These compact kitchen appliances let you cook enough rice for a single serving, and their easy portability means that you can take them with you and cook your rice at your office desk or wherever else you need to be in the early part of the day, letting you enjoy freshly steamed rice once your lunch break comes around.

Of course, even Japanese people don’t eat just rice for lunch, so Thanko also makes two-tier one-person rice cookers. The bottom section is for cooking the rice, and the steam that rises from it is channeled into the upper section stacked on top of it, where it can cook, reheat, or thaw whatever vegetables, dumplings, curry roux, or other side dishes that you’re pairing with your rice.

With restaurant prices rising, Thanko says it’s seeing even higher demand than usual for its one-person rice cookers, and so the company’s designers have made a few improvements. First, they’ve managed to make the cooking process even speedier, and it now takes just 14 minutes to have a batch of rice ready to eat. They’ve added a timer function that will automatically start the cooking process one, two, or three hours after you set it. This new feature was added in order to make the one-person rice cooker easier to use with brown rice, which benefits from a longer soaking period than white rice, and thus increase the variety of meals that can be made with the device.

The one-person rice cooker is even a handy option for car camping, since it’ll work with vehicle power outlets as long as they put out at a voltage of at least 300 watts.

And yes, it’s still as compact as ever and easily breaks down into its component parts for easy cleaning.

▼ The parts shown at the bottom left are even dishwasher-safe.

The new and improved double-decker one-person rice cooker is priced at 8,980 yen (US$56) and just went on sale this week through the Thanko online store here.

Source, images: PR Times
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

High-speed serenity has been low-key available on the Shinkansen for a long time with hardly anyone noticing it.

A new Supreme Class is coming to Shinkansen trains this fall, offering luxurious private cabins for those with deep pockets. It turns out, though, that some bullet trains in Japan have quietly had available private booths for years, and at very affordable prices.

If you’re wondering how this service has managed to escape the attention of so many travelers in Japan, it’s because the private booth is only offered on certain trains, and can only be reserved by certain passengers. Specifically, it’s only found on N700S-series Nozomi Shinkansen trains running on the Tokaido and Sanyo lines (i.e. between Tokyo and Fukuoka’s Hakata Station), and the booth can only be booked by passengers who’ve also purchased a regular seat in Car 7. The booth is located in the connecting area between Cars 7 and 8, and is equipped with two chairs, a counter, standard and USB power outlets, and a window so that you can watch the scenery zoom by from your private space.

You can use the booth either by yourself or with one other traveling companion, and rather than booking it for the length of your trip, it can be reserved, in 10-minute increments, for a block of time up to two hours.

So what’s the surcharge, on top of your Car 7 regular class Shinkansen ticket, to use this private booth? Hardly anything. Prices are just 200 yen (US$1.25) per 10 minutes up to a half-hour, and 300 yen per 10 minutes between 30 and 60 minutes, which works out to 600 yen for a 30-minute session or 1,500 yen for a full hour (payment is done by credit card). Things get a little pricier after that, with 90 minutes costing 2,500 yen and two hours 4,000 yen, but still, this a pretty affordable pocket of serene solitude.

Another likely reason this booth has largely escaped attention from travel fans is that, despite being available since 2022, it hasn’t been pitched to luxury travelers. In fact, JR calls it the Business Booth, and its exclusive availability to Car 7 on N700S Nozomi trains is because Car 7 is designated as the S Work car, which is promoted as being a car for passengers who need to get some work done during their ride. As such, the Business Booth isn’t outfitted with swanky interior fittings, and was primarily designed as a place where you can open up your laptop, lay out some documents, and make phone calls or hold video conferences with professional colleagues. All that said, it still remains a place you can have all to yourself for a while during your Shinkansen journey, even if all you want to do is relax.

Use of the Business Booth cannot be reserved ahead of time. Instead, after boarding you can check for/claim available time blocks via a QR code displayed at the booth’s entrance or on a pamphlet at your seat.

And, once again, the Business Booth is exclusive to N700S Nozomi trains, and if you’re looking for one, JR Central allows you to check which Shinkansen of that class are running on the current day by clicking on the button labeled ビジネスブースを搭載している今日の列車はこちら on their official website here.

Source: JR Central via Maidona News
Top image: Wikipedia/MaedaAkihiko
Insert images: PR Times, JR Central
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Visited same medical center on way up and down the mountain.

August 20 was a bad day for good judgement on Mt. Fuji. We already looked at the story of a 7-year-old Japanese boy whose dad left him to fend for himself on the side of Japan’s tallest mountain, and it turns out that on the same morning, a German woman had to be transported down from Mt. Fuji by rescue workers.

The 33-year-old woman began hiking the Fujinomiya Trail on the morning of August 19, beginning at the trail’s fifth station. In the afternoon, the woman, along with a traveling companion, reached the eighth station, representing a rise in elevation from 2,400 meters to 3,250 meters (7,874 feet to 10,663 feet). However, by this time the woman was suffering from altitude sickness symptoms, which typically include dizziness, fatigue, and nausea. After undergoing a medical examination at the eighth station’s medical center, the woman secured accommodations in a mountain hut and rested through the night.

The next morning, before dawn, the woman got back on the trail and pressed on to the summit, an ascent of a further 526 meters that, according to the official Mt. Fuji climbing website, takes around two hours under ordinary conditions. She eventually made it to the peak, but she would not be able to make it home under her own power.

It’s not clear whether it started happening during her climb to the summit or on her way back down, but at some point, the woman began to once again suffer from altitude sickness symptoms. She was able to make her way back down to the eighth station, but felt so unwell that she again visited the medical center, where it was deemed too dangerous for her to continue the descent on her own. A doctor called for members of the Shizuoka Prefectural Police’s mountain rescue team, who were posted near the ninth station, to come and assist the woman, which they did by transporting her in a bulldozer back down to the fifth station, where the trail meets up with the road network, after which she was transferred into the custody of paramedics who took her to the hospital for examination and treatment.

Following the German woman’s rescue, the Shizuoka Prefectural Police issued a statement reminding hikers, and not for the first time, that if they feel any concern about their physical condition while on the trail, they should call of their ascent.

The details of the woman’s first examination at the eighth station haven’t been made publicly available at the time of this writing, so it can’t be said whether or not her pre-dawn hike to the summit on August 20 was in defiance of the medical staff’s recommendations. However, much like with the incident involving a 99-year-old Japanese woman who needed to be rescued on the mountain last month, should you suffer from injuries or symptoms that require you to rest overnight in a mountain hut, it might be best to take that as a sign that your body isn’t currently up for a hike all the way to the top of Mt. Fuji, and that once you’re able to move under your own power again, down, not up, should probably be the direction you’re walking.

Source: TBS News Dig, Mt. Fuji Climbing Official Website
Top image: Pakutaso
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Eggs run wild for this ever-evolving Japanese tradition.

As we head towards autumn in Japan, the change of seasons brings with it one of the country’s most famous seasonal events: Tsukimi, or “Moon Viewing”. Traditionally, Tsukimi, which takes place on 25 September this year, involves seasonal foods like round dango rice dumplings, which people enjoy while gazing at the moon. With modern lifestyles these days, though, the tradition has evolved somewhat, with fast food chains now adding limited-edition Tsukimi items to the menu, usually featuring a fried egg, due to the way the egg resembles the full moon.

One of the collections we look forward to most every year is the “Torori Tsukimi” series (“torori” means “melty”) from KFC Japan. This year the chain is going all out with the moon-viewing, giving us five limited-edition menu items, three of which are marked as new, with four containing a fried-egg-style omelette filled with a rich and melty egg-yolk sauce.

▼ “新” means “New”

Starting with the more familiar items, which are so popular they’ve become something of a standard release every year, we have the Torori Tsukimi Filet Burger (590 yen [US$3.95]) and the Torori Tsukimi Twister (490 yen), both of which get an eggy upgrade.

▼ The Twister adds teriyaki sauce and mayonnaise for even more melty enjoyment.

The two new burgers take things a step further, with “Kobore Tartar” (“kobore” means “spilling out”) and wafu katsu (“Japanese-style cutlet”) being key ingredients in addition to the egg.

▼ Torori Tsukimi Wafu Katsu Burger Kobore Tartar (640 yen)

▼ Torori Triple Tsukimi Wafu Katsu Burger Kobore Tartar (990 yen)

This towering burger stacks three eggs on top of each other, creating what KFC describes as “an egg-filled burger with plenty of visual impact”. Though the chain bills this as a new release, it was available at seven KFC locations last year (we know because our own reporter Mr Sato tried it). Due to glowing reviews, the chain decided to roll it out at all its branches around Japan this year, so more people can enjoy the triple tower of moon-viewing enjoyment.

▼ Rounding out the collection is the Omochi to Noko (“rich”) Custard no Tsukimi Pie (320 yen, or 450 yen for two)

The dessert also gets an eggier upgrade to qualify as a new release this year, with 20 percent more custard filling compared to its last appearance. The custard is made with Madagascar vanilla beans and is paired with a chewy mochi filling, all wrapped up in crispy pie pastry.

This year’s campaign also comes with a deliciously over-the-top concept video, starring T.M.Revolution frontman Takanori Nishikawa as “T.M.G. Revolution”, with “T.M.G.” standing for “tamago” or “egg”.

The new 30-second video will be released on 26 August, alongside a commercial called “Eggs Run Wild”, starring Japanese model and television personality Shiori Sato.

KFC’s new Tsukimi collection proves you can never have too much egg during moon-viewing season, and it’ll be available while stocks last from 26 August.

Source, images: Press release
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Hey, look who’s coming to Tenga!

Fans of Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt had to wait a long time for a follow-up to the anime series’ initial 2010 season. It wasn’t until 15 years later, in the summer of 2025, that New Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt finally arrived.

However, with the sequel series having consisted of just 13 episodes, fans of the franchise are once again going to have to be patient for their anime-viewing desires to be fulfilled. That doesn’t mean that they’re going to need to practice restraint in all aspects of their lives, though, as Japanese masturbatory aid manufacturer Tenga is now selling officially licensed New Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt versions of its products.

If you were to go strictly by the art style, Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt might seem like an odd choice for a partnership with Tenga. The series’ character designs aren’t particularly sexy or sexualized, especially by the standards of the anime industry where building at least a little titillation into a series’ aesthetic is generally the default strategy. There are literally hundreds of recent anime series that are much more focused on getting viewers in the mood for some self-love.

However, despite the nature of its business, Tenga doesn’t really try to market its products as being sexy in and of themselves. Instead, the company’s aim is to try to remove the awkward stigmatization of doing the wash by hand, so to speak. Similarly, Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt’ s protagonist sisters, demon-fighting angels Panty and Stocking, are shown to be unabashed about indulging their lustful or kinky urges, and that appears to be the thematic synergy that the collaboration is looking to harness.

In addition to the New Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt Special Collaboration Tenga Cup masturbatory aid pictured above, there’s also the New Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt Special Collaboration Tenga Tissue Case.

This, of course, is designed for extracting tissues, not inserting bodily fluids. Tenga describes it as a “divine decoration for your room,” and it could technically be used for entirely chaste purposes, making it equally useful for those looking to blow their nose or their wad.

▼ Size-wise, the tissue case is significantly larger than the Tenga cup.

Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt famously takes a lot of its art and humor styles from American adult animation, and these items made their debut at last month’s Anime Expo convention in Los Angeles. They’re now available for order through both the U.S. and Japan Tenga online shops, here and here, with the cup priced at US$13.99 or 1,200 yen, and the tissue case US$34.99 or 3,850 yen. Just make sure not to mix them up with Tenga’s bug repellant dispensers.

Source: Tenga (1, 2) via Anime News Network/Ken Iikura-Gross, Game Watch
Top image: Tenga
Insert images: Tenga (1, 2, 3)
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Police not pleased with plan of leaving elementary schooler unattended for hours on Japan’s tallest mountain.

“This summer, I hiked Mt. Fuji with my dad!” sounds like a pretty cool opening for a kid’s how-I-spent-my-summer-vacation essay. The composition gets less heartwarming, though, if it concludes with “And then I got to meet some policemen after he abandoned me on the side of the tallest mountain in Japan.”

And yet, that’s exactly what happened to a 7-year-old boy from Nagoya on Thursday. Early that morning, the boy, his 48-year-old father, and his older brother (a first-year middle school student, making him either 12 or 13 years old) had started their hike up the Fujinomiya Trail. At somewhere around the trail’s sixth of 10 stations on the way to the summit, the younger child became fussy, complaining that he was tired.

At this point, the obvious options would be either to offer some words of encouragement to the tuckered-out tyke, take a break so he could rest and recover his stamina, or, perhaps, to simply accept that taking a 7-year-old on an attempt to summit Mt. Fuji was a flawed plan from the start, and so head home. Instead, Dad decided to tell his younger son “Wait here,” after which he and the older boy continued hiking towards the top of the mountain.

It’s not like the summit was just a hop, skip, and a jump away from where the dad abandoned his flesh and blood, either. According to the Mt. Fuji Climbing Official Website, it takes a little over five hours to hike from the Fujinomiya Trail’s sixth station to the peak, and slightly more than two and a half hours to walk back down there from the top. That means the dad was counting on a 7-year-old to sit tight and keep himself safe on the mountain for at least seven and a half hours, and likely longer once you factor in any time spent by the dad and older brother on rest breaks, taking photos, or admiring the view at the summit.

▼ Approximate ascent hiking times on the Fujinomiya Trail

Thankfully, the younger kid didn’t end up having to do that. At around 7:40 in the morning, a worker at a mountain hut near the sixth station spotted the unattended boy sitting by himself on a bench. The worker invited the boy inside the hut and let him take shelter there while the police were contacted. Once officers arrived, they were able to determine the father’s identity and get in contact with him, at which time he was near the trail’s eighth station, and told him to come back and get his kid.

It’s not clear exactly how long the boy was left unattended for, but, once again going by the Mt. Fuji Climbing Official Website’s estimates, it’s a roughly three-hour hike from the trail’s sixth station to the eighth, meaning he likely abandoned his son sometime around 4:30 in the morning.

Thankfully, the boy was unharmed and was safely reunited with his father. However, when the mountain hut worker found the boy, rain was falling and fog was starting to gather. It’s not known what the weather was like when the father left his son behind, but conditions can rapidly and unpredictably change on Mt. Fuji, sometimes leading to rapid deteriorations of visibility, footing, and other safety factors.

“Even if it means having to give up on climbing the mountain together, leaving a child behind is unacceptable” officers told the father, who, at least, seems remorseful, saying “I made a rash decision, and I deeply regret it.” Following the incident, the police are calling on hikers to be conscious of the dangers of leaving a member of their party behind, reminding those taking to the trails that they should tailor their pace and ambitions to accommodate the member of their group with the lowest amount of stamina.

Source: TBS News Dig, FNN Prime Online, Mt. Fuji Climbing Official Website
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Mt. Fuji Climbing Official Website
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

Jiro dreams of sushi, but he never would’ve dreamed of this.

When you’re visiting Japan on a tight schedule and trying to pack as much as possible into your short time here, being able to do two things at once can be a timesaver. It can also become a weird, surreal and Japan-only experience, if the new “Sushi Bus” is anything to go by.

This unusual new attraction combines conveyor belt sushi with a sightseeing bus tour, by putting a working sushi conveyor belt on the second floor of an open-top double-decker bus to create a new experience that’s said to be the first of its kind in the world.

Developed by Sushi Bus Co. in collaboration with Willer Across, which rents out restaurant buses with onboard kitchens, this new service is as impressive as it sounds: passengers sit on the second floor of an open-top bus while sushi travels around them on a conveyor belt, allowing them to eat as they take in views of Tokyo.

▼ Yes, the sushi really will be moving around the bus.

The bus will depart from the Kajibashi Parking Lot near Tokyo Station, but unlike a conventional sightseeing tour, it won’t be travelling to a specific destination. Instead, it will go on a spin around the city, much like the conveyor belt inside it, passing famous sites while passengers enjoy all-you-can-eat sushi on the 70-minute tour.

The restaurant bus has a kitchen on the first floor, where staff prepare a variety of sushi. An elevator inside the bus transports the finished sushi to the second floor, where a staff member places it onto the conveyor belt running alongside the passenger seats.

▼ The elevator system in action.

The current plan is for the bus to have just 20 seats, so there will only be 20 diners on board. The company says this limited capacity is part of the appeal, and because the bus is so unusual, it’s likely to attract plenty of attention as it travels around Tokyo. making Shibuya Scramble Crossing, Ginza and Kaminarimon in Asakusa some of the likely contendors for sites along the yet-to-be determined route.

The Sushi Bus concept, which has been in development for roughly two and a half years, started with an April 2024 illustration of what the bus might look like.

The road to making it a reality involved a lot of testing and lateral thinking, as the companies involved had to work out a way to install a sushi conveyor belt on a moving vehicle while also dealing with the kitchen facilities and other requirements involved in operating a restaurant bus.

▼ Team members hard at work, to accomplish “a project no one had ever attempted before”.

The conveyor itself required extensive testing with Kitanihon Kako, a major Japanese manufacturer of sushi conveyor systems, to prevent sushi from falling off the belt in the case of sudden braking.

▼ This test-ride video shows how well the sushi stays on the belt, even when the bus comes to a sudden stop.

Sushi Bus says there are currently only five restaurant buses operating in Japan, all owned by Willer Group. One of the five has now been renovated to become the Sushi Bus, which is said to be the first of its kind in the world.

▼ The company says it can accommodate a variety of dietary requirements, including religious dietary restrictions, allergies and “vegitarian” requests.

The new service is currently set to begin with one bus in Tokyo, although the company hopes to eventually expand to other major tourist destinations like Osaka and Kyoto as well.

The planned price is 16,000 yen (US$101) per person, with online reservations here and five departure times scheduled each day: 11 a.m., 1 p.m., 3 p.m., 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. The bus is scheduled to begin operating in Tokyo on 10 October.

Sources: Press release, YouTube/@株式会社SUSHIBUS
Featured image: YouTube/@株式会社SUSHIBUS
Insert images: Press release
● Want to hear about SoraNews24’s latest articles as soon as they’re published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!