RocketNews24 / Bringing You Yesterday's News From Japan and Asia, Today (Page 10)

Thai DJ Puts iPhone on Blast…from an iPhone

May 6, 2013 by Preston Phro
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Just as hidari no ko vs migi no ko is dividing Japan, iPhone vs Android has divided the world. And that division is most clear in the ceaseless battle between Apple and Samsung. Where patent lawsuits once captured our attention, stealth marketing and negative campaigns have suddenly sprung up. And today’s news out of Thailand is all the more bizarre for its tactlessness. Read More

Increase in Male Rape Victims Concern Zimbabwe Police

May 6, 2013 by Master Blaster
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Police in Zimbabwe’s eastern province of Manicaland are asking men to stay alert following an increase in rapes perpetrated by one or more groups of women. The announcement was made following a four-day sexual assault of a young male soldier by a gang of four women.

May 6, 2013 by Preston Phro
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Should you happen to be in Tokyo this Golden Week, you have until Tuesday (May 7) to check out a free (!!!) art gallery displaying some beautiful works by Amano Yoshitaka. If the name doesn’t ring any bells, some of the projects he’s worked on surely will: Final Fantasy, Vampire Hunter D, Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, and the incomparable Sandman: the Dream Hunters.

And if you happen to have a few extra yen laying about, you can also pick up some original pieces! The least expensive one we found was only about 40,000 yen (US$402), and the most expensive we spied was about 3.8 million yen (US$38,381). Even if you can’t pick up the original art, you can still get postcards, posters, notebooks, and calendars with Amano’s brilliant art. And! You’ll get a poster just for coming by!

Photo and event information below! (Some of the photos are not safe for work!!!) Read More

Looking for Love? Break the Ice Over Red Meat at this Barbecue Joint Famous for Turning Patrons into Couples

May 5, 2013 by Mike
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Typically a heaping plate of raw meat isn’t exactly the type of food you’d picture putting people in an amorous mood, but this tiny watering hole-slash-barbecue joint in Kanda (one station over from Tokyo) is famous for bringing patrons together through the magic of a hot grill, cold drinks, and very, very close quarters.

The interior of the restaurant, Rokkakai, is only 6.6 square meters, meaning complete strangers are pretty much forced to crowd around and share a single, rectangular table. We can see where this might result in the odd coupling, but that’s apparently not the only secret behind the location’s uncanny ability to bring people together.

May 5, 2013 by Oona McGee
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State-sponsored textbooks issued to 870,000 first and second grade elementary school students in Korea this year have mistakenly used photos featuring Japanese people on their covers. The mishap was confirmed after much speculation about the nationality of the subjects in the photos. They were said to have different features to Koreans, namely more defined double-creased eyelids and less-defined cheekbones.

May 5, 2013 by Cara Clegg
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Say ‘sushi’ and you automatically think ‘Japan’. But a recent taste test by the experts suggests that the perfect sushi may not be 100 percent Japanese. Read More

Double the Fries in One Container! Is the Mega Potato Coming Back to McDonald’s Japan?

May 5, 2013 by Michelle
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According to rumors on a 2ch thread and “confirmed” by a current “McDonald’s employee,” the Mega Potato is coming back to Japan and it’s just as awesome as the name implies. Consisting of the equivalent of two large orders of fries, the Mega Potato is said to arrive in a specially made doublewide vessel on May 17.

May 5, 2013 by Master Blaster
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A group of local residents around the Nation of Japan had established a plan to issue “I Conquered Nation of Japan” certificates to people for 500 yen (US$5) a copy. The plan was a small way to help promote tourism to the area. However, when the news broke, people from all over the country wrote in, protesting the scheme and calling it “inappropriate.”

May 5, 2013 by Cara Clegg
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As if two anime series, two manga series, a game, and countless merchandise weren’t enough, the popular light novel series Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai (English title: I Don’t Have Many Friends) is now to be made into a live action movie and is currently looking for extras. Read More

Finally! Spaghetti and Hotdog Are Now As One!

May 5, 2013 by Master Blaster
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The science world has been reeling as a photo surfaced demonstrating what might be a successful fusion of hotdog and spaghetti. However, many pasta experts remain skeptical claiming, “Man, ain’t no way you can put a piece of dry spaghetti through a wiener! It’d break!” This photo documentation says otherwise, however, and the end result looks really good too!

May 5, 2013 by Oona McGee
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Pontocho is one of Kyoto’s most beautiful geisha districts. With traditional tea houses, restaurants and bars all crowded together along atmospheric, stone-paved narrow lanes, this area breathes the air of an old, timeless Kyoto. Within its maze of weaving, intersecting alleyways, there are plenty of secrets to discover and hidden areas to explore. Walking through Pontocho, you might notice one of its many mysteries: the area is dotted with Japanese paper lanterns, all bearing the mark of the chidori, the plover bird. They’re incredibly beautiful, but why would a cute chidori design come to be on such traditional products?

May 4, 2013 by Master Blaster
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Many of us have that friend who visited China only to return with terrifying tales of disgusting toilets, particularly in the rural areas. Frankly though, horrific public toilets are a global problem that must be dealt with. However, being the staunch pro-toilet campaigner (preferring them to a tree or ditch) I want to reiterate, “toilets don’t foul up toilets, people foul up toilets.” This is a policy the China seems to agree with and as such have been creating toilets with revolutionary designs that ensure people use them with the utmost patience. Two more have been discovered and are currently doing the rounds on China message board tt.mop.

May 4, 2013 by Andrew Miller
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According to news correspondence from Wuhan City in China, a Chinese-Korean woman used the internet to befriend a man from China only to discover that on meeting face to face, he fell short of her expectations. The woman then contacted local authorities claiming that she had been “cheated.”

The woman, Ms. Chan (35), who is of Chinese descent but possesses Korean nationality and resides in the city of Suwon, Korea, first made contact with the Chinese man (37) from Wuhan, China, via the Chinese instant messenger software QQ. The man is believed to be employed part-time. After several chat sessions, the couple are said to have hit it off and as a natural course of events, the woman suggested flying over to China to meet in person. However, for one reason or another, the man would always claim to be busy and say that it was difficult for him to take time off from work.

May 4, 2013 by Rachel Tackett
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Across the globe there seems to be this stereotype that Japanese men are feminine and weak-willed. You can see it in the slang term for this new generation of young Japanese men, “herbivores,” implying that they have absolutely no craving for womanly flesh. A Chinese journalist even went so far as to say that the sex drive of a Japanese male is as underdeveloped as a third world country. Harsh words from a writer in a country full of virgins.

But is there any truth to this claim? And more importantly, does this mean that Japanese men are bad in bed?! Japanese media decided to get a better perspective on the matter by asking foreign women to dish about their Japanese boyfriends’ bedroom performance. Their responses spoke only of satisfaction and should serve to stroke a lot of Japanese male egos. Read More

Students in Japan Create a Robot That Can Balance on a Ball

May 4, 2013 by Michelle
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Oh Japan, you never disappoint in the robot department. This one in particular may look a little plain compared to the femme bots in Shinjuku or a $1.25 million giant robot, but it’s still really cool. Created by two students at Tohoku Gakuin University in Japan, this little guy is able to perfectly balance on a ball while carrying a load and moving.

May 4, 2013 by Master Blaster
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In our continuing endeavor to visit McDonald’s restaurants around the world we sample the unique regional offerings the international chain creates to appease the locals and delight tourists.

This time RocketNews24 sent a reporter to a McDonald’s in the Philippines to sample one of their localized combos centered by a heap of McSpaghetti. The following is their report.

May 4, 2013 by Oona McGee
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Your drink’s icy cold but the manga ice cubes in your glass are h-h-hot! Now taste the palpitating sound effects from your favourite comic books thanks to these new Manga Kōri, Comic Ice silicone molds from Runa Corporation.

Coming in three designs, ゴゴゴ (go-go-go, the sound effect for rumbling), ドドド (do-do-do, the sound of running, galloping and whirring machinery), and あ゛あ゛あ゛ (a-a-a, best translated as “Arrgh”), all appear in your glass in the same font that’s often scrawled over tense moments in a manga character’s storyline.

May 4, 2013 by Preston Phro
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Teaching is not always the most financially rewarding job, is it? Even in Japan, where getting a good education is highly valued, teachers can find themselves on hard times, like this unfortunate young woman from Osaka.

A 29-year-old teacher from Osaka has resigned from her position after receiving a six-month suspension for taking a part-time job as a call girl.

May 4, 2013 by Philip Kendall
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Oh, money, you make me smile like it’s Christmas Day and the cat’s just coughed up a shard of rainbow. As a man who spent most of his university years trying to work out ways to make potato chips and sliced bread viable alternatives to meat and vegetables, during the brief moments that I have a bit of cash in my bank account these days I become a noticeably nicer person to be around. I won’t even try to gouge your eyes if you greet me in the street.

This pillow is for people like me. People who want that warm money glow 24/7, so that even when our bank accounts are empty, our hearts are filled by the shallow but immediately believable promise of happiness that only cold, hard cash can bring.

May 4, 2013 by Oona McGee
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From office buildings to towers to hotels, urban environments across the world have seen huge improvements in vertical design over the years. But in amongst all this creativity and innovation, there was always one building left waiting for a look-in: the humble multi-storey car park.

Now, thanks to an international architectural competition, there’s a futuristic new proposal set to revolutionise the way we park our cars. It’s called the “CarPARK”, and it aims to provide a great day out parking for the whole family.