As per Motoki Sugiyama, a former middle school teacher in Japan’s school, administrators told him that girls must not wear a ponytail because exposing the nape of their necks could “sexually excite” male students.
While referring to how most schools require girls to wear white undergarments so that they won’t show through their uniforms, Sugiyama said, “They’re worried boys will look at girls, which is similar to the reasoning behind upholding a white-only underwear colour rule.”
“I’ve always criticized these rules, but because there’s such a lack of criticism and it’s become so normalized, students have no choice but to accept them,” he added.
Sugiyama has taught at five different schools in Shizuoka prefecture, some 90 miles southwest of Tokyo, over the course of 11 years, all of which prohibited ponytails.
A man, dressed in a Joker costume and flaunting a knife, stabbed at least one commuter on a Tokyo passenger train before starting a fire.
As per reports, the Tokyo Fire Department said 17 passengers were wounded, including three seriously. Not all of them were stabbed and most of the other injuries were not serious, the fire department said.
The criminal identified as 24-year-old Kyota Hattori, was detained on the spot after Sunday’s attack and was being investigated on suspicion of attempted murder, the Tokyo metropolitan police department said Monday.
The attacker, riding an express train headed to Tokyo’s Shinjuku station, abruptly took out a knife and stabbed a seated passenger in his 70s.
Police said he told the authorities that he wanted to murder people and get the death penalty. Nippon Television said he also said that he used an earlier train stabbing case as an example.
Japan’s Princess Mako will marry a commoner, her former classmate, this month after years of controversy as she will give up her royal status, BBC Newsreported.
The couple is all set to tie the know on October 26.
The couple initially planned their wedding in 2018, but this was put off, reportedly after Mako’s boyfriend, Mr Komuro’s family had run into financial difficulties.
They are expected to move to the US after marriage where Mr Komuro works as a lawyer.
This excessive media coverage around the princess — whose father is Crown Prince Fumihito — and Mr Komuro’s family over the years has caused the princess to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, the Imperial Household Agency said, according to news outlet Kyodo.
Her aunt, Empress Masako, also suffered from a stress-related illness, due to intense pressure to produce a male heir. There is often a stigma around mental illnesses in Japan. The couple first met in 2012 when they were students at the International Christian University in Tokyo.
They were engaged in 2017 and were set to marry the following year. But news of Mr Komuro’s mother’s financial problems started doing the rounds; she had reportedly taken a loan from her ex-fiancé and not paid him back.
The palace denied the delay was linked to this, though Crown Prince Fumihito said it was important for the money issues to be dealt with before they got together.
Princess Mako will reportedly forego a traditional lump-sum payment of up to 150 million yen ($1.3m), which is normally gifted to a member of the royal family upon their departure from the household.
She is also expected to skip the usual rites associated with a royal family wedding. If she skips both the payment and the rites, it will make her the first female member of the Japanese royal family to do so.
Under Japanese law, female imperial family members forfeit their status upon marriage to a “commoner” although male members do not.
People in Japan have been sending bags of rice that weigh the same as their newborn babies to relatives who are unable to visit them due to the coronavirus pandemic.
As per details, the phenomenon of “Dakigokochi”, which means rice-filled bags shaped like a baby covered in a blanket and printed with the newborn’s face and name, is becoming immensely popular among new Japanese parents amid restrictions due to the pandemic.
The price of the bag depends on the size of the baby. Some companies charge one yen a gram, with a 3.5kg pack is priced at 3,500 yen (Rs 5,207).
Naruo Ono, the owner of Kome no Zoto Yoshimiya rice shop says they first had the idea about 14 years ago when their own son was born. “I was thinking about what I could do for relatives who lived far away and couldn’t come and see him. So we decided to make bags of rice that were the same weight and shape as the baby, so relatives could hold them and feel the cuteness.”
Ono has since started making the bags for wedding celebrations as well. The wedding rice bags became more famous than the birth ones.
“During the pandemic, the demand for them has really increased as people haven’t been able to travel to wedding ceremonies,” added Ono.
A man who stabbed 10 female passengers on a train in Tokyo was arrested by the Japanese police, public broadcaster NHK reported.
As per reports, the 36-year-old man told the police that he wanted to kill women who appeared happy and chose his targets randomly. A woman in her 20s who was attacked is critical, according to the Japanese media.
The Tokyo Fire Department said nine of the 10 injured passengers were shifted to nearby hospitals, while the tenth was able to walk away. All of the injured were conscious according to the fire department officials.
The Japanese capital is currently hosting the Olympics, which end Sunday. The site of the stabbing spree was about 15 kilometers (9 miles) away from the main National Stadium.
The suspect left his knife behind when he ran away, and later walked into a convenience store and identified himself as the suspect on the news, and said he was tired of running away. The store manager called the police after seeing bloodstains on the man’s shirt.
Another local media outlet said he told the police he developed the intent to kill women who “looked happy” and stabbed a woman who happened to be seated near him in the train. He also told the police that he chose to stage the attack inside a train because it offered the chance to kill a large number of people.
The suspect was also carrying cooking oil and a lighter, with which he allegedly intended to set fire inside the carriage, NHK reported.
A witness at a nearby station where the train stopped said passengers were moving out of the carriages asking for help and shouting that there was a stabbing. Another witness told NHK that he saw passengers smeared with blood come out of the train, as an announcer asked for doctors and for passengers carrying towels.
Paramedics and police immediately arrived at the station, one of the witnesses said.
A Pakistani, Haroon Qureshi, who arrived in Japan as a student some 30 years ago, is reaching out to those living on the margins of society.
According to a report published in Mainichi, the national daily of Japan, Qureshi, a businessman from Pakistan, helps the homeless and those foreigners who have been detained by immigration authorities after failing to get refugee status.
He is also involved in the running of a mosque in Tokyo, Otsuka Masjid.
According to the Japanese daily, Qureshi’s efforts started just when he arrived in Tokyo to study computer programming in 1991. He began distributing food to the homeless in his neighbourhood in the capital’s Kita Ward.
“Now, three decades on, he has enlisted Japanese university students in his goodwill endeavours, seeing their involvement as a vital part of raising society’s awareness of the plight of the less fortunate,” it said.
The 55-year-old Qureishi said he believed there was a lack of understanding in Japan of why people ended up on the streets. He thinks the public’s attitude to the homeless is “cold.”
“The reality is that many times the homeless suffer from mental health issues and cannot fit into society,” the daily quoted him as saying.
So far, Qureshi had asked for students from Tokyo-based Keio and Tokyo universities to volunteer in his activities, which included serving meals to the needy.
In collaboration with Tenohasi in Tokyo’s Ikebukuro area, students and volunteers from the mosque recently helped in providing food to over 360 people.
“Today I witnessed a stark difference between normal people who were walking on the streets all dressed up, and those who had come to get food here,” the daily quoted Satoru Soejima, 18, who is studying Arabic at Keio University, as saying.
Qureshi, meanwhile, also leads another project called Food Bank to help the students themselves, some of whom have gone hungry after losing part-time work because of the coronavirus pandemic.
A soft-spoken man, he has also been helping those detained after their failed asylum bids since around 2000.
In one month, Qureshi received around 30 letters on average seeking help from detainees, mostly from countries in Africa or elsewhere in Asia.
“We may have different religions, colour or race. But I request everyone to try and feel the pain of other members of this huge (human) family, and do what they can,” he urged.
In recognition of his services the Pakistan Embassy in Japan awarded him with a letter of appreciation.
Ambassador Imtiaz Ahmad invited three extraordinary Pakistanis living in Japan for their social work that has also been highlighted in the Japanese media, including Qureshi.
According to the embassy, Qureshi was appreciated for his services that include providing food for the needy, financial help for the destitute and homeless, running an Islamic school and managing a graveyard for the Muslims.
The ambassador appreciated Qureshi’s work while stating that it has contributed positively to Pakistan and Pakistanis’ image living in Japan.
Qureshi thanked the Ambassador for the appreciation and vowed to continue and expand his humanitarian work, the embassy said.
A gigantic 3D cat has been installed on a billboard at Tokyo’s busiest railway stations. The 1,664-square-foot curved LED screen shows a giant 3D calico cat in a 4K display between the hours of 7 am to 1 am. The 3D cat behaves like an actual cat.
It is first startled awake in the morning, by afternoon it stands and meows at people who pass by and then, in the evening, it lies down to fall asleep and rests its head on its paws.
It also greets pedestrians with “nyannichiwa” – a combination of “konnichiwa” for hello, and “nyan” for meow.
The display will officially launch next week. Test broadcasts have been going on since last month and many social media users have seen and shared how awestruck they are.
Japan is currently closed to tourists so the company behind the display has posted a live-streaming view of the billboard on YouTube. However, they said that specific angles can affect how the 3D effect is viewed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ-Cg5c0CD4
Takayuki Ohkawa is a spokesman for Unika, one of the two companies behind the feline display. He told The New York Times that the cat does not have an official name yet, although fans have been calling it “Shinjuku east exit cat”. He explained the reason behind creating the 3D cat was to help cheer people up during the current pandemic.
“There are many reasons we decided to display the cat, but one of the big reasons is that with corona, the world became very dark. Through the cat display, we wanted to revive Shinjuku and make it brighter,” said Ohkawa.
Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has said that Pakistan is the “powerhouse of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector” as the country tech exports climbed six times in one decade.
In JICA’s official statement, digital Pakistan policy 2018 is the key driving factor behind the success of the IT sector in Pakistan. Besides, six-time growth is the highest growth rate in entire South Asia.
The fundamental reason behind the IT growth is the competitiveness and the presence of a large number of freelancers that are willing to give quality services at affordable rates.
The report published by JICA was a year-long researched based study that was conducted in collaboration with Pakistan Embassy Tokyo.
The publication has also placed Pakistan as a new partner for Japanese IT companies. The report gives an overview of the ICT industry in Pakistan, its performance in IT exports, the support structure provided by the Pakistani government, a pool of skilled and young human resource and achievements of a growth-led ecosystem equally owned by public and private sectors.
This study includes an “IT skills survey 2021”, which found that Pakistani ICT engineers are highly skilled in programming, software development, data processing and analysis, infrastructure architecture and cloud engineering.
The report also includes feedback on Pakistani ICT engineers already working in Japan who consider Pakistan an untapped market for Japanese IT companies, encouraging them to know more about Pakistan and its collective potential in ICT.
Ambassador of Pakistan to Japan Imtiaz Ahmad welcomed the project team in March 2020, offering them complete support of the Mission while thanking JICA for its continued support in export and development sectors in Pakistan.
In the past, the same team of experts from JICA has rolled out various projects for human resource development; value addition in textiles; technical training and water and sanitation infrastructure in Pakistan.
Miyagawa pretended to be in a serious relationship with all 35 women. However, none of the ladies knew of each other and the 39-year-old would receive expensive and fancy presents from them for his fake birthdays.
The man’s real birthday is November 13. While he used different dates with many different women to get more gifts. He received $925 in gifts which included electronics and clothing.
The ladies allegedly registered a complaint with the police. Officials believe there could be more women who Miyagawa deceived.
Japanese Ambassador to Pakistan Matsuda Kuninori on Wednesday visited a Buddhist historical site, known as Shah Allah Ditta Caves, in the outskirts of Islamabad. Internationally known as Buddhist caves in the Margalla Hills, the historical site is preserving around 2,400-year-old Buddhist era murals.
As per reports, the ambassador along with his wife and staff of the embassy praised the grandeur of the antique caves which date back to the times when young Buddhists covered long distances to reach this region that expands from the Margalla Hills to Taxila, Swat and beyond.
The Buddhist monks spent time here in meditation and spread the message of Buddha on to the followers.
Former Deputy Mayor of Islamabad and a representative of the Shah Allah Ditta community, Syed Zeshan Naqvi, welcomed the ambassador and told him that the caves date back to the times of Alexander the Great. He also pointed out issues faced by the local government of Islamabad (that completed its term earlier in February this year) in the preservation of the site.
The caves had different engravings of Buddha on its walls that are of great historical importance.
The ambassador was also of the opinion that the caves have a huge tourism potential and can be used to showcase the footprints of the Buddhist civilisation in Pakistan.
Ambassador Kuninori also spent a few moments in meditation under the old Banyan tree at the site.
Sharing his thoughts during the visit, Ambassador Kuninori said Pakistan was a safe country and appreciated the way the government had fought the COVID-19 pandemic by implementing a smart lockdown. Japan, he said, had already eased travel restrictions on Pakistan.
