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Chichibugahama Beach looks like a Makoto Shinkai anime come to life, and is well worth a detour off the beaten travel path.

Kagawa Prefecture, which occupies the northeastern corner of Japan’s island of Shikoku, isn’t above getting a little silly in its tourism promotions. It’s the prefecture that announced it was making a Pokémon its governor, and it plays wholeheartedly into the rest of the country thinking of it as “the udon prefecture,” going so far as to hold a combination foot race/noodle-eating contest.

But the Kagawa town of Mitoyo is perfectly capable of making us desperately want to visit without utilizing any sort of wacky comedy.

Coastal Mitoyo’s most scenic spot is the one-kilometer (0.6-mile) long Chichibugahama Beach. A popular swimming spot in the summer, it’s also worth checking out in the off-season, because of the breathtaking sunset views.

As the tide goes out, pools of shallow water form at various spots on the beach. On days when low tide and sunset happen at roughly the same time, if there’s no ripple-causing wind and the surface of the water is calm, it acts like a gigantic mirror, seemingly merging sea and sky.

▼ Honestly, with a backdrop like that, we wouldn’t be surprised if those umbrellas are magical and the two friends flew off into outer space right after the picture was taken.

▼ The 30 minutes before and after sunset form the optimum hour for picture-taking.

The closest train station to Chichibugahama is Takuma Station, on the Yosan Line. It’s about a 40-minute ride from the prefectural capital of Takamatsu, and once you get to Takuma there are buses that can take you to the Chichibugahama bus stop, which is just a short walk from the sand.

Granted, Kagawa isn’t on the standard Tokyo-to-Kyoto stretch that most foreign visitors to Japan spend most of their travel time on. But it’s well-worth a detour, especially since while you’re on Shikoku you can also check out the amazing Shimanami Kaido island-hopping bicycling course.

Related: Chichibugahama Beach website
Top image: Mitoyo City Tourism Association press release
Insert images: Mitoyo City Tourism Association press release, Chichibugahama Beach website

Troubling statistic is coupled with an additional one-in-four saying they’ve heard the word, but don’t know what it means.

In Japan, as in many countries, science and technology tend to be predominantly male pursuits, at both the academic and professional levels. Critics argue, though, that an educational background in those fields, and access to their associated careers, is becoming increasingly important for women in modern economies.

Those who find the lack of women in computer science concerning probably won’t be happy to hear that in a recent survey, 44.7 percent of Japanese elementary school-age girls said they’re not even familiar with “programming” as a vocabulary word, let alone what a programmer does.

Children’s magazine Chara Parfait, in conjunction with Kadokawa Ascii Research Laboratories, conducted a survey between December 1 and January 20, collecting responses from mail-in cards included with issues of the magazine. The researchers received a total of 358 responses from girls in elementary school, 249 of whom were in their first, second, or third year, and the remaining 109 in years four through six.

When asked about programming, 44.7 percent of the girls said they’d never heard of it, with another 27.4 percent saying they’d heard the word, but don’t know what it means, which combines for 72.1 percent who don’t know what programming is, even in broad, basic terms.

▼ It might as well be a discipline of magic to them.

On the other end of the spectrum, 3.1 percent said they were currently learning about programming in some sort of educational program, with another 9.8 percent saying they hoped to study programming in the future.

It’s worth pointing out that in Japanese, programming is called puroguramingu, a corrupted pronunciation of the English “programming.” Because of the pronunciation quirks of puroguramingu and its being written in katakana script, it’s instantly recognizable as a foreign loanword, which might account for why young kinds might have trouble picking up the vocabulary, especially as they’re at an age where they’re still acquiring purely indigenous words and phrases with much more relevance to the daily life of a child. One could argue that expecting six-year-old Japanese girls to know what “programming” means is sort of like expecting six-year-old girls in America to understand “laissez-faire.”

Still, as far as foreign loanwords go, puroguramingu is a pretty easy one. It’s so commonly used in Japanese that there really isn’t an indigenous Japanese substitute, and it’s pretty simple to explain the basic meaning of “making computer programs.”

Unfortunately, the researchers didn’t give any figures as to how familiar grade-school boys are with the term “programming,” likely due to Chara Parfait’s readership being heavily female, and so it’s hard to say whether the girls’ responses have been influenced by their gender, or simply reflect an overall aspect of children in Japanese society. On the plus side, though, the majority of parents in the Chara Parfait survey said they’d support programming lessons being part of their children’s grade school curriculum, so maybe in the future more girls will be made aware of programming, thus allowing them to take the first steps towards a career in the field.

Source: Rese Mom via Otakomu
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Pakutaso

It's a pretty good crowd for a Saturday and the manager gives you a smile - 'cause he knows that it's you they've been comin' to see to forget about life for a while. But the question remains:

SHOULD YOU SING THEM A SONG?

Family Mart’s newest drink campaign shoots for the moon and promises a rainbow of dreamy starshine flavors.

Whether you get taken in by the craze or not, there’s no denying the gravitational pull of a limited beverage. Starbucks Japan’s seasonal offerings make headlines almost every holiday, and even something as classic as a Pepsi or Sprite gains an exotic edge from a unique (or equally important, limited) flavor.

Family Mart, one of the most popular convenience store chains in Japan, is no stranger to the power of a constantly rotating drink menu. Visitors can buy staple drinks like coffee, tea, and hot cocoa at the stores’ Family Mart Café machines, but every season also comes with its own specialty flavors in the form of Family Mart frozen frappes.

To get your own, pick your frappe base right out of a freezer, add hot milk from the café machine, then mix it with the special extra-wide straw. Voila, a great-tasting frappe without the coffee shop price tag!

▼ Just remember to use milk to mix it, not tea or coffee. Ahem.

These seasonal frappes usually play it safe on their trip to Flavortown with flavors like milk tea, strawberry, or chocolate mint. The newest additions to the line-up are much more adventurous, and promise to boldly go where few convenience store drinks have gone before…

The dramatic ad above introduces our two new stars. On the top, billing itself as “the taste of space”, is the Galactic Grape frappe. This frappe comes with colorful stripes of flavor: yellow (lemon), purple (blackberry and grape), and turquoise (orange).

Once filled with the hot milk and mulched into submission by your straw, the colors and tastes blend into a gorgeous grape-flavored galaxy that could give the Unicorn Frappucino a run for its money. It’ll make for a good selfie too!

If sci-fi isn’t your thing, the Fantasy Peach frappe is described as “a fanciful flavor from dreamland”. Bands of dark pink (white peach), orange (vanilla yogurt), and pale pink (lemon) swirl together into a beautiful pastel concoction that wouldn’t look out of place in a fairy tale. Once all those bands harmonize, the drink will taste like peach yogurt.

Both these otherworldly experiences can be yours for just 290 yen (US$2.65) per cup, and they’ll be in Family Mart freezers from April 29th.

What if your tastebuds aren’t especially adventurous? Family Mart has you covered. From May 6th, the stores will stock the rich and aromatic Café Frappe. Coffee beans from Columbia and Brazil form the base of this creamy classic, and it’s dusted throughout with ground Ethiopian Mocha beans. It’ll cost 270 yen (US$2.50) a shot.

Finally, you can grab the Banana Gelato frappe, though you’ll have to wait all the way until May 13th. Crammed full of rich banana juice and pieces of banana fruit imported from the Philippines, this drink has a special twist: buy a packet of the special chocolate syrup to squirt over the top and it’ll harden into a crunchy coating. As a choco-banana fan I can’t wait to shell out an extra 35 yen for that!   The Banana Gelato drink retails for 320 yen (US$2.95).

▼ Banana Gelato Frappe + Crunchy Choco Syrup = Chocobanana Frappe!

Are these funky new flavors going to be enough to take on the coffee kings of Japan? Could you stomach a Galactic Grape frappe taste mixed with tea instead? Most importantly, which of these frappes do you want to try? Let us know!

Sources: Entabe, Family Mart
Top image: Family Mart
Insert images: Family Mart (1, 2)

She has trouble standing and taking a bow after her performance, but her hands glide like the wind across the keys.

Talented musicians come in different packages, and we’ve even seen some that were a little unexpected, like a wandering samurai, a six-year-old girl, and a busty gravure idol, so we aren’t really surprised by much anymore. Nevertheless, this seemingly frail 85-year-old Japanese granny and her amazing piano skills sure have impressed us.

A video of her playing was uploaded by YouTube user kimurama1 in August, but it was shared on Twitter just the other day by @hokuro_, and now it’s got over 400,000 views on YouTube and almost 170,000 likes and retweets on Twitter. Why? Well, just watch.

You might think that for such a cute little Granny, she’s not going to be able to play anything really crazy. Maybe a slow sonata or something somewhat basic, but with the potential to be cool, like “The Entertainer.” But no, this Granny is here to impress: she’s playing Franz Schubert’s “Impromptu Opus 90 No. 4”.

“Impromptu Opus 90 No. 4” is not an easy piece; it switches keys twice and has a 10-page score, which at one time contains a non-stop stream of quarter-note chords for both hands. It’s more than eight minutes long and involves a lot of moving up and down the keyboard, but this granny is not fazed. She effortlessly plays the entire song, with the help of a page flipper, and even looks like she’s having a great time doing it.

▼ Look at those hand flourishes!

She’s not just skillful at playing the right notes in a complex melody, though; her playing is emotional and full of musical expression. She plays the Impromptu in such a way that it feels like the melody is floating around you, filling you with the emotions of it. And like a true pianist, when she finds a phrase that’s especially fun to play or is especially beautiful, she leans forward in anticipation. Her joy in the music is evident.

▼ These hands may look weathered, but they are as strong as ever.

Amazingly, half the time she doesn’t even look at the sheet music! After finishing off the Impromptu with some triumphant staccato chords, she takes a moment to relax and let it sink in that she played such an exulted piece before taking a bow with a big smile. While standing, she needs to stabilize herself with the piano and the chair, but her arms and hands needed no assistance to play the music.

At the end of a video some words are exchanged, but it’s hard to hear what is being said. The video descriptions and tweets are not clear as to what the occasion for the performance is; the video only said that it is a birthday party, though for who it doesn’t say. Nevertheless, this granny managed to impress her audience, both physical and digital, as netizens all over Japan sing praise for this unexpectedly talented pianist:

“She has excellent movement and expression of the notes. What a wonderful performer! I want to send her a ‘Bravo!'”

“She’s not just good, she’s got an ear for musical expression that must have been developed over decades of experience.”

“I want to be like this lady when I’m old! If I can only continue playing the piano until my last days, I’ll be happy.”

“It’s wonderful just watching her play, even without sound. Just looking at the pauses, the fingers, and the wrists, you can tell she’s not an ordinary pianist.”

“Watching her muscles tense when she’s getting swept along by the melody matches well with the power of her performance. She’s very cool.”

“Her fingers are so light! Wow! It’s such a nice recreation of the song, and it really stimulates the brain.”

Granny’s talent and skill on the piano may be a surprise to some, but it’s likely she’s got a whole lifetime of experience in playing the piano behind her, so in hindsight we ought to have expected her to be brilliant. Besides, we should know never to be surprised by the elderly in Japan, who can be just as active, creative, or heroic as anyone else.

Source: YouTube/kimurama1 via Twitter/@hokuro_ via My Game News Flash
Images: YouTube/kimurama1 

Finally, a real-world Pokémon adventure where you don’t have to worry about getting hit by a car.

Many of us have probably dreamed of going on a real-life Pokémon adventure, befriending little weaponized critters and throwing balls at their faces. For a time it seemed Pokémon GO was the answer to those prayers, but only until very recently it seemed their idea of an “adventure” was months of aimless repetitive tasks.

So perhaps this upcoming escape game utilizing Nintendo’s library of pocket monsters will fill that wanderlust in the hearts of all Pokémon fans. Named Escape from the Amusement Park of Wind, it will be held in Tokyo an Osaka and lets players lose in real amusement parks.

According to the game’s website, players take the roles of participants in the Wind Festival, a yearly event that attracts legendary Pokémon. However, Team Rocket has also been drawn to the festivities and are up to no good.

After a series of strange incidents, the fairgrounds are sealed off and you must solve mysteries to unlock the blockades and escape. Along the way there will be many pokémon whom you can catch and have aid you in your sleuthing.

The Tokyo game will be held at Tokyo Dome City Attractions from 14 July to 24 September, and the Osaka edition will run from 18 July to 17 September at Hirakata Park. In either case tickets can be purchased in advance and will allow players to get their hands on an advance play guide to help them prepare.

▼ This event is a tie-in with the upcoming movie Pocket Monster: Everybody’s Story, which also features a Wind Festival.

This is a relatively laid-back escape game as well, with no time-limits and groups of one to whatever able to join. There’s also an optional simplified kids course for the tykes or adults whose attention spans have eroded from decades of playing Pokémon.

As with most escape games, there aren’t many details. How players interact with the Pokémon is the biggest mystery and really the crux to how cool this game will be. Still, it looks promising, and even if doesn’t live up to expectations, you’re still at an amusement park and can perk up your spirits with a brisk merry-go-round ride or karaoke on a Ferris wheel. You can’t lose!

Event information
Escape from the Amusement Park of Wind / 風の遊園地からの脱出
● Tokyo
Tokyo Dome City Attractions / 東京ドームシティ アトラクションズ
Tokyo-to, Bunkyo-ku, Koraku 1-3-61
東京都文京区後楽1-3-61
14 July – 24 September
10 a.m. – 8 p.m. Weekends / Holidays
3 p.m. – 8 p.m. Weekdays
Tickets from 3,300 yen (U.S.$31)
Website
● Osaka
Hirakata Park / ひらかたパーク
Osaka-fu, Hirakata-shi, Hirakatakoen-cho 1-1
大阪府枚方市枚方公園町1-1
18 July – 17 September
Times vary throughout season
Tickets from 3,300 yen
Basic game-only tickets available for 800 yen at the entrance
Website

Source: Escape from the Amusement Park of Wind
Images: @Press