Twentythree

春节期间，你被亲戚问过哪些奇葩问题让你觉得蜜汁尴尬？结尾高能神回复！生动形象！

This limited-time cafe is only open through Valentine’s Day!

The Hakata Hankyu department store in Fukuoka Prefecture is ready for Valentine’s Day. The eighth floor of the building is currently dedicated to a Valentine Chocolate Fair, with some of the best purveyors of chocolate around selling their finest. While most women in Japan will be buying a majority of their chocolate for male coworkers or acquaintances (known as “giri-choco“), others will be buying for their significant other.

Alongside the chocolate vendors will be a limited-time cafe, set up to allow patrons to relive the innocent feelings of love experienced in Valentine’s Days past. The Homeroom Cafe will have handsome waiters dressed in school and sports club uniforms, as well as other male waiters dressed as teachers, to “bring back those youthful memories of school-aged puppy love.”

福岡の博多阪急の8階にてバレンタイン展示会があってますー！ そこのホームルームカフェというところで働かせてもらってます😋💓 学校帰りとかによかったら会いに来てください(*˘︶˘*).｡.:*♡ 学ランだよ🙄 出勤日は1.4.… http://twitter.com/i/web/status/8…

—
こーでぃー (@yry0814) February 01, 2017

With the purchase of a drink (prices start at 280 yen (US$2.50), customers will also receive two complimentary pieces of chocolate to sample. Customers can submit poems about love in the senryuu style, which is similar in structure to a haiku but instead deals with themes of human nature and is often satirical or ironic. They will also be offering “Valentine color advice” to help improve your “feminine strengths.” These advice sessions last for about 15 minutes, and are limited to only 20 people per day.

Image: Hakata Hankyu

If you happen to be passing through Fukuoka between now and February 14, a visit to the Homeroom Cafe could be a fun way to get you in the mood for Valentine’s Day, and along the way you can pick up some delicious chocolates for you or your friends at the chocolate fair too!

Restaurant Information
Homeroom Cafe / ホームルームカフェ
Address: Fukuoka-shi Hakata-ku Hakata-eki Chuogai 1-1
福岡市博多区博多駅中央街１－１
Open: February 1 – 14, 10 a.m. – 8 p.m. (until 6 p.m. on February 14)
Website

Source: Hakata Keizai Shimbun, Hakata Hankyu
Featured image: Twitter/ @yry0814

But sometimes the driving factor is who they don’t want to sit by instead.

While trains in Japan can get extremely crowded, it’s not like it’s standing room-only all the time. If you’re not travelling during the peak commuting times or near the last train of the night, you might even find yourself with multiple empty seats to choose from if you want to sit.

And therein lies a question: given a choice, how do you choose which seat to plop yourself down in? To examine one criteria, Japanese website Shirabee polled 1,400 men and women between the ages of 20 and 69, asking if they want to sit next to someone of the opposite sex on the train, and found some very big discrepancies depending on demographic.

Percentage of respondents who’d want to sit next to someone of the opposite sex:
● Men 20-29: 34.1 percent
Women 20-29: 10.8 percent
● Men 30-39: 32.9 percent
Women 30-39: 11.59 percent
● Men 40-49: 40.4 percent
Women 40-49: 7.9 percent
● Men 50-59: 39.4 percent
Women 50-59: 9.9 percent
● Men 60-69: 43.2 percent
Women 60-69: 6.9 percent

Not surprisingly, men were far more amenable to sitting next to a woman than vice-versa, with the number of respondents who felt favorably about the idea showing a distinct jump after the 20-39 age group. Meanwhile, women exhibited slight bumps among respondents 30-39 and 50-59, but in general were far less enthusiastic about sitting next to a man, with the statistics shaking out with at least a 21-percent gap in attitudes among men and women in the same age brackets, and a whopping 36.3 percent difference among those aged 60-69.

▼ Which perhaps explains why this elderly gentleman is riding the rails stag.

However, not all of the men who like the idea of sitting next to a woman feel that way for lascivious reasons. Rather than finding themselves drawn to feminine charms, some of them simply don’t want to sit next to another guy. Male passengers, some men assert, are more likely to have offensive body odor or reek of alcohol at the end of the day, and sitting next to them is an unpleasant experience even for guys if they happen to hold themselves to higher hygiene standards.

Other men said they’d prefer to sit next to a woman since men, on average, have larger frames and sit with their knees further apart, thus taking up extra space on the bench seating that Japanese trains predominantly have.

Oddly enough, though, one woman who was polled said that she actually prefers sitting next to men because they tend to carry smaller, or fewer, bags than female passengers. Some women she says, place their bulky belongings on the seat next to themselves and encroach on their neighbors’ space, and in light of such complex variables, perhaps many of those who didn’t reply to the survey by specifically saying they want to sit next to people of the opposite sex responded as they did because they judge all seating options on a case-by-case basis.

Source: Shirabee via Otakomu
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert image: Pakutaso

Although they are stopping just short of calling it an actual “health cola,” Coca-Cola Plus is the latest addition to the health-oriented cola war in Japan.

It’s long been reported that the population in Japan is steadily aging, and with that the nation’s buying trends are shifting as well. This is something the Coca-Cola Company has been watching closely as well. After all, they didn’t become one of the largest brands in the world by sitting around and doing nothing.

Contrary to previous diet colas that are simply less-harmful with lower amounts of sugar and calories, Coca Cola Plus is being touted as the first Coke that may actually improve your health.

In addition to having no calories and sugar, each bottle contains five grams (0.18 ounce) of indigestible dextrin and other dietary fibers. Coca-Cola says that drinking one bottle each day along with meals will both reduce the absorption of fat from the food and moderate the levels of triglycerides in the blood following the meal.

This is a bit of a departure from other fat-blocking colas in that Coca-Cola Plus actually has a recommended usage. For the cola to have its intended effect, you should only drink it while eating a meal and limit yourself to one bottle per day – presumably divided into three 150-milliliter (5.1-ounce) servings.

▼ The Coca-Cola Plus website touts a seven percent reduction in triglyceride levels compared with eating the food with a regular diet cola.

Clearly this is aimed at people over 40, for whom a bottle of regular Coke a day could more easily lead to several health complications but still crave the flavor. That being said, Coca-Cola is refraining from calling Coca-Cola Plus a healthy drink, instead opting to call it a Tokuho Cola.

Tokuho is short for Tokutei Hokenyo Shokuhin (food for a specific health use), which is a Japanese legal term to classify products that claim to have health benefits but haven’t passed the rigorous testing that “health foods” require to call themselves that.

Giving Coca-Cola the benefit of the doubt, this could simply be a time-saving strategy to get Coca-Cola Plus released more quickly in the ever-increasing market of fat-blocking, health-oriented carbonated drinks like Mets Zero or Pepsi Special.

Granted, that’s a big leap of faith to give a brand that has been rarely synonymous with good health choices. However,  it’s an intriguing concept, and we’ll keep an open mind. Those of us at RocketNews24 who are over 40 and facing increasinglyexpansive waistlines just may pick up a bottle for 158 yen (US$1.40) when it hits the shelves nationwide on 27 March. It would come in really handy with the meals eaten around this office.

Source: Coca-Cola Japan 1, 2
Top image: Coca-Cola Japan
Insert images: Coca-Cola Japan (1, 2)

This week I sat down with my friend Denis Merkas of MELT. Our conversation wasn’t just a promotional video for MELT, instead we talked about marriage, business, and of course the benefits of their videos. Plus, I asked Denis how often he gives his wife a massage now. If you’re not sure what MELT is, […]

The post Conversation with Denis Merkas of MELT appeared first on Simple Marriage.

Two foreign passengers are the star characters in this true story that touched the heart of a Japanese commuter.

Travellers to Japan are often surprised by the cultural differences that present themselves during a journey around the country. Even on trains, there are a number of unspoken rules and practices that are different from those you’d find back home, including taboos involving eating onboard, and the accepted practice of sleeping in all types of awkward positions while en route to your destination.

Now, Japanese Twitter has come alight with another story from the rails, and this time it’s a couple of foreigners who are melting hearts, with a tale of kindness that’s giving Japanese people pause for thought with a custom that’s instilled in Westerners from an early age. The act of courtesy was so touching that a fellow commuter decided to share the story online in a series of cute illustrated images.

今朝電車でほっこりした話を聞いてくれ ※汚い絵でごめんね🙇 https://t.co/gBnZ9OTdP9

—
天野ゆま (@_M_Y_M_) January 26, 2017

With tens of thousands of likes and retweets, the sweet story begins with an image that sets the scene for the heartwarming tale. A foreign mother and child sit together on a train seat opposite the artist, @_M_Y_M_, with the sounds of the rails initially drowning out their animated conversation.

When the artist finally manages to overhear their conversation, it becomes clear that the Pikachu-hat-wearing boy is trying to sound out the word “sumimasen”, which means “excuse me” in Japanese. As the mother continues to correct her son’s Japanese, @_M_Y_M_ wonders why they would be practicing the pronunciation of that particular word.

Finally, the boy pronounces the word correctly, looking quite happy with his achievement.

To the surprise of the artist, the boy immediately stands up and taps a commuter on the back, saying the word he’d carefully practised with his mother, “sumimasen!”

The commuter turns out to be an older lady, and as she turns around, the boy points to his now vacant seat as his mother gestures for her to sit down.

The lady gratefully takes the boy’s seat and thanks him in Japanese, after which the young child continues on the rest of the journey while standing in front of his mother.

The artist then realises that the boy and his mother had been practising the Japanese word for “excuse me” so he could get the older lady’s attention in order to offer her his seat.

Touched by this turn of events, the artist created a manga strip to share the story with everyone on Twitter. It turns out that fellow Twitter users were equally moved by this act of kindness, leaving comments like:

“This makes me think we can have peace in the world!”
“What a wonderful story!”
“A kind encounter like this would fill me with happiness for the rest of the day!
“I’m always so ashamed to see young Japanese people sitting down on public transport without a care for the older people in front of them.”
“If only Japanese commuters could follow the example of this young boy!”

While it’s true that the western custom of giving up seats for older or less able people on public transport is one that’s less prevalent on Japanese buses and trains, the pride of some of the country’s senior citizens can sometimes make it a difficult minefield to navigate in Japan.

Still, with stories like this one filling so many people with happiness, there’s a good chance that this type of common courtesy can continue to become more widespread in the future. There certainly is a whole collection of tales of kindness on Japanese trains, so hop on over here to check out more of them!

Source: Net Lab
Featured image: Twitter/@_M_Y_M_
Insert images: Twitter/@_M_Y_M_