Seawolf comments

I know a country desperate for more rice to put on the market...

 Ever heard of tranquillisers?

Ever heard of how easy/not it is to successfully use them on bears? And how much effort, manpower, and costs it would take to relocate bears? Or where to relocate them to?

It is about time. I live in the mountains, surrounded by forests. I have seen very fresh scratch marks near housings in two areas this spring, signs that some young bears trying to establish their own territories.

For anyone who hasn't been to the outskirts of farming villages, abandoned farms does not only mean cheap houses to buy, but the rice paddies will overgrow with thick brushes and trees in very short time, giving boars and bears perfect camouflage to get very close to houses and fields still in use as well.

On top of that, climate change has lead to unstable weather patterns, less rain when it's needed, and higher temperatures, making it more difficult for animals to find food like acorns, chestnuts, walnuts etc in the forests.

So according to this article, there is a shortage of rooms (or only very expensive ones), which might impact the number of visitors, but even now there are concerns about overtourismn? And of course it's all the fault of those bloody foreigners, never mind that many would rather go to other entertainment places, be it Disney, TeamLabs, or just Japanese gardens, than queuing at this place!

Rats (and mice) have been and will be a problem in Tokyo with all of it's old buildings and back alleys. When working in a restaurant in a backstreet of Ginza, right below the highway, we had a sound system of "distressed rat calls" to be turned on when finishing at night to keep the real rats away. And we put in acrylic covers in front of the lights at the resets of the ceiling so that no rats would accidentlly fall down. Another place, old, renovated house, had rats crawling up between the inner and outer walls. Had to get in a professional who added metal grids and layed out lots of those very sticky sheets at night. He told us how many he catched and at one point that he could smell a dead rat behind one of those grids next to the stairs to the cellar...

I'm sure a certain politician will just pardon him and make him minister of entertainment ;-)

Looks like there are lots of people on JT today who invested in Tesla stocks :-)

The most ridiculous in all this is the government themselves, telling us inflation is at 3.1% comparing to one year ago, just because their way of calculating is to leave out all the food items that are skyrocketing in price!

Of all the olympic disciplines, "Walking" is on the very top of things that should be canceled. It is a very unnatural, artificial looking form of movement and we already have lots of different running events, track as well as road. On top of that, catching a cheater during the race is very manual, by more or less watchful eyes only, no AI support here. Just get rid of this whole stuff.

If you need to go by car bc of luggage, family etc, Narita is the far better choice with cheap long-therm parking that even bring your car right to the exit when coming back, so you only need to store anyone/thing once and are good to go.

Japan's obsession with Onsen is more a witness to their sub-par construction of houses that were only a bit warmer than outside in winter. Hence the need to use Onsen to warm up the body ;-)

So many Germans here...! ;-)

Sadly no words about other sites like this as there are many more...I have used LITB for cheap fun cycle jerseys, was ok, bought again other stuff, and might buy some bigger stuff in the future from Ali Baba. And nearly bought something yesterday on Tradeinn.com, huge selection for sport and outdoor stuff, easy to navigate, and all in Japanese, but on checkout I realized the product would ship from Spain and the costs for that were just exorbitant!

It fills me with anger and sadness to see nearly 100% of the comments ONLY feeling sorry for the bear that was killed. Nobody of you living outside of that big bubble Tokyo? There are so many reasons this bear got killed....1.Bear population has been growing, leaving less space for young ones to establish their own domains. 2. The ongoing climate crisis has led to unstable weather patterns in the mountains, resulting in less food 3. The depopulation of villages and the aging of the remaining residents has led to rice paddies being abandonded. These abandoned fields are now overgrown with vegetation, providing ideal cover for bears to approach human settlements. 4. This particular location was far from any forested areas, suggesting the bear was at least disoriented, if not sick with something else 5. Bears possess excellent memories. Even if released into the wild, this bear would remember that a) humans are not strong and b)  their homes offer abundant food. And the next time it might have resulted in a loss of human lives. Furthermore, releasing a young bear into unfamiliar territory justbefore hibernation (Akita is a bit colder than Tokyo already) won't do much good anyway, it either would have died from starvation, be killed by a stronger bear, or seeking food again in human dwellings during the spring very hungry!

I remember seeing a short spot in the news showing a figure on the balcony in front of the flames...guess it was taken off the air for now because of ongoing investigations?

All nice and good, but the Kamikochi valley has closed down now for winter, and while it is still possible to go there, and many people actually enjoy the beautiful snow scenery in winter, it is rather complicated to do so. So, why now? Couldn't you get this article done like one month earlier?

...and then they need more toilets, lots more toilets! Which use a lot of water and electricity, and create lots of hazardous waste that has to be dealt with. And more shops, more space to accomodate all these tourists. Why do these people think everything is scalable without limits, crazy. Oh, and why not use cablecars, cheaper to build and operate, great views from above as well. And much less vulnerable to earth movements than rail tracks.

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The biggest question though is what about phone holders? Would make it very much the same as in cars, but one is legal the other not? Welcome move to hold cyclists responsible for their actions, but letting cars off the hook doesn't sit right.

Is there any "stand your ground" part going together with this? Like, wacking that stupid cyclists who comes at you with a phone in their hand? And what about holding an umbrella while riding in the rain? Very common in the more urban areas, and dangerous as well.

What really puts me off with Disney, at what really shows their current managment style, is the fact that since it's inauguration about 4 years ago, the app you need to get into, and around the whole place, has been bugged and the English version is far less informative than the Japanese one. Of course the user reviews show this, but D. doesn't seem to be bothered by this at all. Plus the fact that there is no wifi in the whole place, so foreign visitors who didn't plan ahead, a f#cked up.

Nope, it's definetly not a must see item. Maybe 3m at it's highest point, but it looks less than 2m high at most. And while it is a natural phenomenon, the town has gone to great lenths since long ago to keep the forrest above from sliding down onto it, by slapping a concrete cover unto it. And it pales not only by size but by the volume of water flowing from it compared to the "real" Shiraito falls west of Mt Fuji (20m high and 150m width).

Commercial for LITB shopping site?

Global air flows have changed a lot, hence we see more and bigger typhoons, hurricanes, etc than before and with a changed moving pattern. No way to put out a forecast for the weather a few months ahead, when they can't even predict the weather for the next day, at least in my little place on the side of the mountains...And that is even before we start to discuss how open a conservative institution like this is to new types of calculating changed patterns...

Back in Germany it apparently has become ok to use flamethrowers to get rid of weeds, bc it is the most convinietn way, sometimes resulting in burning down the whole garden, or even the house. Guess Japan is following the modernisation of other western countries ;-)

Here in Nagano, the Tsuruya supermarket chain sells "Apple Butter", albeit with butter in it, guess there was no American at hand to teach them the recipe.

As expected, no word on the unionising efforts by the staff, and the company trying to sabotage it. If you want your customers to feel at home, start with the staff, only they can deliver that "vibe"!

For all you Climate deniers et al, you could dispute the main causes of climate disaster, but not the fact in itself. And as for this tree, Shanshan took this very unique course because, as it was reported in the news a few times, there are unusual massive warm air areas west and east of Japan bc the temperature of the ocean has been rising and this caused the Typhoon to bounce back and forth.

Can I bring my chainsaw to provide for real 3D sound?

What exactly are the negative impacts of this so-called overtourism? It's not some fragile eco system up there, so the biggest impact are trash and toilet waste, both of which can be taken care of without cutting the number of hikers substantially. How about promoting/upgrading the other 2 routes more with better access so people have more choice? People climb Mt Fuji because it is the highest mountain in Japan, and it is much easier than the Peaks in the Japanese Alps. And many of these hikers do it as a once-in-a-lifetime challenge, no matter wether Japanese or Foreigners, so how about trying to support these people by educating them, not by throwing some hurdles at them?

I once went with my girlfriend to a small Unagi place and watched how the chef took out an eel from a basket, put it on a wooden board, thrust a pin through it's neck and split it (or something like that) while stretching it straight by holding it's tail end with the other hand. Not the best scene to make you hungry. Yes, I know, chickens don't die peacefully, neither do pigs or cows in the slaughterhouses, but maybe lets keep the number of varieties of food we put in our mouth down a bit.