Japan

[Witness]

Japan offers spouses apartments to avoid ‘coronavirus divorce’

"Please consult with us before thinking about 'coronavirus divorce'," said the firm.

“Please consult with us before thinking about ‘coronavirus divorce‘,” the Tokyo-based Kasoku urges customers, offering its Airbnb-like fully-furnished units as “temporary shelters” for people to escape the family, whether to work or just get some peace and quiet.

State of emergency

Japan’s government has declared a state of emergency in seven regions over the virus outbreak. While the measures do not include prohibitions on going out, people have been asked to avoid unneccessary outings, schools are closed and many people are working from home.

For those finding that arrangement onerous, Kasoku is offering apartments priced at 4,400 yen ($40) a day.

30-minute divorce consultation

Spokesman Kosuke Amano told AFP the company has had 20 customers since it began the campaign on April 3. The service also comes with the offer of a free 30-minute divorce consultation with a legal official.

“Among the users of this service are a wife who said she fled after having a big fight with her husband, and a woman who said she wants time to herself as she is tired of taking care of her children who are at home all day because of school closures, while her husband works remotely at home,” Amano said.

“We don’t have solid data showing divorce is on the rise, but media reports that divorce rates are rising in China and in Russia after lockdowns there led us to come up with this service,” he added.

While the firm is marketing the apartments in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, the service has also attracted users facing serious problems, including a woman fleeing domestic violence.

The company has about 500 units around the country, mainly in central Tokyo, and a fall in tourism means many are empty, though demand for remote offices for telework is helping offset the impact.

https://www.siasat.com/japan-offers-spo ... e-1874524/

Not sure how the "divorce consultation" comes in with that.

[Pyrrho]

https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/wo ... ale-series

Front cover to a ca. 1910 crepe-paper reprint of The Goblin Spider

[Abdul Alhazred]

Interesting historical sidelight.



Best viewed full screen.

[shuize]

So Osaka prefecture has issued a "strong request" for businesses to "voluntarily" close. Voluntarily, of course. They apparently don't have the legal authority to order closings and might even have to pay compensation if they did. A few pachinko parlors ignored the request and stayed open so the governor of Osaka prefecture resorted to the very Japanese practice of shaming. He held a news conference and publicly named the pachinko parlors. This is the first time that's happened.

It's funny to me because the wording in the video calls it "A strong request 'based on the law' to take a holiday." They apparently had to pass a "Special Corona Virus Measures Act" even to be able to do that.

You can tell the governor is serious because he's wearing his "serious" work clothes and has that mad way of pulling the corners of his mouth back (best example around :54) when he says, "Even though we requested they close, they didn't." (Ha. Ha.)

Here is the video in Japanese.

[Rob Lister]

I must not be tuned to the facial expression; I don't see it. Does it have an Anglo equivalent?

[Hotarubi]

I spotted it. Happens for a fraction of a second.

Hard to explain but it most looks like this:

Grimace.jpg

[shuize]

I must not be tuned to the facial expression; I don't see it. Does it have an Anglo equivalent?

Well, I was mostly laughing about the silliness of the "strong request 'based on the law' to voluntarily take a holiday."

But I seem to recall his relative youth (44? Hey, that's "young" in Japan) getting some attention. So I threw in big boy "serious" work clothes and the big boy "mad" facial expression as a joke. But, yeah, he did seem mad that his "request" was not followed by everyone.* We'll have to ask the other forum members in Japan if they recognize that facial expression.


* He says something like 700 pachinko parlors honored the request. These six delinquents did not. Seven hundred seems like a lot to me. Maybe it's an Osaka thing. Years ago, I lived near a pachinko parlor and people would be lined up around the block waiting to get inside before it opened. I think the idea was to get a certain machine. I've never really understood the fascination with it. But it must be the gambling aspect.

[Witness]

Osaka mayor under fire for saying women dawdle at shops

The mayor of Osaka has come under fire for suggesting men should do grocery shopping during the coronavirus outbreak because women are indecisive and "take a long time."

Japan is under a state of emergency over the pandemic, and residents in some areas have been asked to shop less frequently and only send one family member out to get supplies to limit contact.

Osaka Mayor Ichiro Matsui told reporters on Thursday that men should be entrusted with grocery runs because women "take a long time as they browse around and hesitate about this and that," Kyodo news agency reported.

"Men can snap up things they are told (to buy) and go, so I think it's good that they go shopping, avoiding human contact," the 56-year-old added.

When challenged by a reporter, he acknowledged his remarks might be viewed as out-of-touch, but said they were true in his family.

https://japantoday.com/category/politic ... e-at-shops

Yeah, yeah, women, so frivolous.

I often see dudes shopping while remotely operated by their wife (I presume) via smartphone. Depending on the goods they're trying to find it can get a tad pathetic.

[shuize]

Osaka mayor under fire for saying women dawdle at shops

The mayor of Osaka has come under fire for suggesting men should do grocery shopping during the coronavirus outbreak because women are indecisive and "take a long time."

He's not wrong.

Also, this is not the same guy I mentioned above.

[Witness]

Amabie: the Japanese monster going viral

People across the world are drawing images of a mythical Japanese spirit believed to help ward off plagues.

Largely forgotten for generations, Amabie, as it’s known, is an auspicious yokai (a class of supernatural spirits popularised through Japanese folklore) that was first documented in 1846. As the story goes, a government official was investigating a mysterious green light in the water in the former Higo province (present-day Kumamoto prefecture). When he arrived at the spot of the light, a glowing-green creature with fishy scales, long hair, three fin-like legs and a beak emerged from the sea.

Amabie introduced itself to the man and predicted two things: a rich harvest would bless Japan for the next six years, and a pandemic would ravage the country. However, the mysterious merperson instructed that in order to stave off the disease, people should draw an image of it and share it with as many people as possible.

This curious encounter was promptly published in the local newspaper, accompanied by a woodblock print of Amabie’s likeness, which helped to disseminate its image across Japan.

For much of the past 174 years, Amabie has remained rather dormant. But as the coronavirus has swept across Japan, its image has recently resurfaced on social media, bringing hope that those who share it are helping to end the current pandemic.

http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/2020042 ... oing-viral for the rest.

[shuize]

Amabie: the Japanese monster going viral

People across the world are drawing images of a mythical Japanese spirit believed to help ward off plagues.

Japan is still surprisingly superstitious.

As a university student, I made some money working part-time as an English conversation partner. One topic which could always get the students talking was "blood type." Many Japanese people still seem to believe your blood type determines your personality.

Although, I do remember one girl who firmly said, "I hate that kind of thinking."

I should have married her.

[Witness]

I should have married her.

The tiger is always on the prowl.

---

Now I wonder if the Japanese are really more superstitious than Westerners, or just more naively open about it? If we had weird shrines for, say, Cosmic Astrological Forces™ I'm sure a lot of people would flock to them. In other words it's also a matter of social acceptance.

And if we count religion amid the superstitions, oh boy!

[shuize]

I should have married her.

The tiger is always on the prowl.

I was still young and naïve back then and didn't think it was proper for "teachers" to date students, so nothing ever happened.

Idiot!

But for some reason that conversation always stuck in my head. Who knows, maybe she's the one responsible for making me look at things more skeptically.

Now I wonder if the Japanese are really more superstitious than Westerners, or just more naively open about it? If we had weird shrines for, say, Cosmic Astrological Forces™ I'm sure a lot of people would flock to them. In other words it's also a matter of social acceptance.

And if we count religion amid the superstitions, oh boy!

Japanese people are fond of telling foreigners they're not religious. And that's true from a western standpoint. But even my girlfriend, who likes to think of herself as "Super-Rational-Lawyer-Girl,"* has a charm against car accidents in her new car. She may even have gotten it blessed, I'm not sure. It'd be like her not to mention it, knowing I'd laugh at her for it.

Years ago, I went along on a small tour of Kyoto with former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. We pointed out the various temples and shrines. Of course, she wanted to know the difference. Temples are Buddhist. Shrines are Shinto. "Which are most Japanese?" she asked. The two answers from those riding in the car: "Both" and "Neither."


* She's not. She's gets highly emotional. But I've since learned the way to win arguments is through Muhammed Ali's "Rope a Dope" technique: Sit back and let her wear herself out. Then take her apart once she's exhausted.

[Witness]

Western view of religion is quite ethnocentric and we tend to draw a sharp line between religion and superstition. Small wonder after ~ a millennium long stranglehold of Christianity on society as a whole.
This hasn't always been the case (e. g. the Romans were quite pragmatic with a state religion you had to participate in but left you free to believe in any deity you chose – Mithraism for example was very popular with the troops) and can of course be different elsewhere.

So perhaps the Japanese just see a gradation (in the "supernatural"?) where we try to pin somewhat irrelevant categories.

One thing I find cute in Japanese religiosity is the 算額 placed in Shinto shrines.

[Anaxagoras]

I should have married her.

The tiger is always on the prowl.

---

Now I wonder if the Japanese are really more superstitious than Westerners, or just more naively open about it? If we had weird shrines for, say, Cosmic Astrological Forces™ I'm sure a lot of people would flock to them. In other words it's also a matter of social acceptance.

And if we count religion amid the superstitions, oh boy!

Probably not. There are some things that people do probably more because it's a tradition rather than they really believe it will bring them good luck. (like buying an omamori* or going to pray at a temple or shrine on New Year's.)

* These:


To be sure, there's plenty of superstition here, I just don't think it's really more than or less than in other places, just done a little differently.

When you come home from a funeral, whoever's waiting for you at home will throw salt over you before you come inside, to drive away bad spirits or some such thing, so you don't bring them into the house. I don't really understand that one, but it's a tradition.

[shuize]

This does not inspire confidence.


「看護師が“感染患者と一般患者を掛け持ち”　第二大阪警察病院」


The accompanying article says nurses in Osaka Dai 2 (number 2) Police Hospital* cared for non-Wuhan Corona patients immediately after caring for Corona-positive patients.

As of April 25, they've confirmed 24 in-facility infections and two deaths.

Reminds me of the American nurse who immediately got on an airplane after treating an Ebola patient.


https://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=2020 ... snewsv-l27


* Not just for policemen anymore.

[shuize]

So after the free advertisement public "shaming" of those pachinko parlors, four are reportedly still open.

Here is video of one of them.

The story apparently warranted a helicopter.

[Anaxagoras]

So after the free advertisement public "shaming" of those pachinko parlors, four are reportedly still open.

Here is video of one of them.

The story apparently warranted a helicopter.

Lol

Well some people will leave their babies in a hot car to go play pachinko.

[Anaxagoras]

Japan to review top obstacle to telework — the personal seal

[Rob Lister]

The council will also review another administrative custom of requiring a resident to report to a city office to directly request a service. The face-to-face requirement is proving a hindrance to government requests that people to stay home amid the nationwide state of emergency declared to curb the pandemic.

Seems a bit more bureaucratic than here. But the fax ain't dead here yet, so maybe not.