What's Happenin' In Japan

Money To Breed

2007-03-30

posted by Akemi

Within Japan what is considered one of the most serious long-term problems facing the country is a lack of young people. A combination of factors ranging from expensive education to ingrained social systems have resulted in a generation for whom having one or two children is the norm. The result is a population that is actually shrinking and aging, without enough young people to man the workforce or care for the elderly.

The government has been trying to figure out a way to encourage folks to have more children, and now private industry is getting involved as well.

The latest example is The Japan General Estate Co., Ltd. (J). On March 5th, they announced (J) a drastic new measure against the declining birth rate in Japan: "The Support System For Third Children."

Starting April 1st, any employee who has a third (or more) child will have all child-rearing expenses covered by the company. This includes everything from hospital bills for the birth to education until the child graduates from Junior High School. This will, apparently, include even the astronomical costs associated with private schools, and the company is said to be considering medical expenses as well.

This is not the first effort the company has made to improve Japan's declining birthrate; They have already upgraded and expanded their maternity leave system, as well as introduced a plan to help customers who are raising children.

Why are they doing this? They claim it's part of an altruistic desire to contribute to the national effort to fight the decline in Japanese birth rates. Further, they say that it will motivate employees and inject energy into the work environment.

As far as it making business sense, some company spokespeople have said during interviews that the real estate business depends on there being people to sell homes to, so if you take a long enough view it's a form of self preservation.

This is far from the only example of companies paying their employees to have more children.

According to an Asahi.com article (J), SoftBank (English site) will begin supporting children of employees born after April 1st with a sort of baby shower bonus.

The third child will receive 1 million yen (about US$8,500), the fourth 3 million, and the fifth and further children 5 million yen each. Even the bonus for first and second children will increase to 50,000 and 100,000 yen, respectively (US$425 and US$850).

Although these sorts of congratulatory gifts are not uncommon, payouts of 1 million yen or more are unusual even for large companies. Up to this point the "birth bonus" was based on how long the employee had been with the company, with amounts ranging form 3,000 to 15,000 yen (US$25-125) per child.

As for how the numbers work out, the benefit is available to any full-time employee who has worked at the company for at least one year, including employees of SoftBank's three wholly owned subsidiaries, which ads up to 12,000 employees.

Currently, only 360 of their employees have three children, 53 have four, and a mere five have five children; they are apparently estimating that it will cost about 100 million yen (US$850,000) during the first year.

Still not convinced? When an employee's child enters Middle School, SoftBank's cellular phone subsidary will give them a smartphone of their own along with basic service for as long as the employee remains with the company.

The idea is being credited to Masayoshi Son, the company president. As for why, Asahi.com is reporting that the company believes it will improve the work environment and attract good employees.

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Real-Life Letters From Iwo Jima Find Home Six Decades Later

2007-03-28

posted by Marc

In a heartening case of life taking a cue from art, Clint Eastwood's Oscar-nominated film Letters From Iwo Jima inspired an aged veteran to return letters he took from that Pacific island over half a century earlier to the family of their owner.

As reported in this Times Herald-Record article (English), a Times Herald-Record video report (also English), TBS News (Japanese), and a variety of news sites carrying an AP story.

Vic Voegelin was an 18-year-old sailor in the U.S. Navy during the Allied assault on Japanese-occupied Iwo Jima. After the fierce battle was over, Voegelin found a small bag on the beach containing 108 letters and post cards belonging to one of the many Japanese soldiers killed in the attack that day. He kept the letters when he returned home.

TBS News quoted Voegelin as saying that while keeping the letters initially seemed like a good idea, as he grew older he began to look at it differently. He realized that the owner of the letters had people whom he loved, and wanted to somehow return the letters to them.

62 years later, the now 80-year-old Voegelin said that he was spurred by Clint Eastwood's film to try and find the family of the soldier to whom the letters were addressed. He first tried contacting the film's production company, then the Japanese embassy in New York, but neither had any desire to help. He then contacted a local newspaper--the Times Herald-Record--which passed the story on to Japanese news services.

The story received national attention in the Japanese media, and the family was found almost immediately. The letters were written by a young Masaji Matsukawa--still alive today--to his older brother Tadashi, who was a First Lieutenant in the Japanese Army.

The Matsukawa family had been informed of Tadashi's death by the Japanese military, but they never knew where he had been killed. Although it took 62 years and a man who had been an enemy reaching out in a gesture of peace, Masaji finally was able to find a sort of closure knowing where his brother had died.

Voegelin was unable to bring the letters to Japan personally, but after a month of logistical arrangements they were finally delivered to Tadashi's younger brother, who spoke with Voegelin by phone through an interpreter. Masaji reminisced in front of cameras as he read the words he had written so long ago. Although the letters were formal in tone and the content subject to strict censorship before being delivered to the front lines, the younger brother's concern for his older brother is evident and they offer a glimpse at the circumstances in Japan during the war.

Some excerpts as published by TBS News (story no longer available online):

"We couldn't sleep well last night because we were so excited about news of the war. We ate oseki-han [a festive red bean and rice dish]."

"I will work like mad this year. I'm not going to let you outdo me, older brother. I'm going to follow you [to war]."

"The weather turned terribly cold today. My hands and feet are numb from the cold. Please do not fret since both father and mother are doing well. I am relieved now that I know you are also well. Mother is pleased. Well then, take care of yourself and keep your chin up."

TBS News noted that Masaji said that the post-war for him had finally come to an end. For his part, Vic Voegelin said told the Times Herald-Record that his small gesture was for once a story about peace, not war.

Labels: international friendship

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Police Brutality of a Different Sort

2007-03-23

posted by Akemi

Japanese police have an image of being polite that is not always deserved. On Sunday the 18th of March a police officer who apparently had nothing better to do spent his day off yelling at a store clerk.

The incident occurred in Kushiro City on the northern island of Hokkaido. The off-duty officer, in his 30s, arrived at a cell phone store at 11:00am to exchange his old phone for a new one and get his data moved from his old phone to the new one. Unfortunately (for everyone involved), the store wasn't able to get all of the data transferred.

What happened next, according to the store, puts a new twist on "police brutality." The customer became so irate about the immobile mobile phone data that he began loudly berating the store's staff. His threats, according to news reports, included phrases to the effect of "Don't think I'm going to let you off with just an apology! If I asked you for 1 million yen, would you give it to me?!"

His rage was so great that it frightened off other customers, and his tirade was apparently audible even from the office one floor above the showroom. The Japanese have a saying that "the customer is god," and the store did it's darndest to fulfill it, putting up with the irate man all the way until 7:00pm, when the store usually closed. Finally, in desperation, the owner called the police.

Three officers arrived shortly thereafter, but the result wasn't quite what the owner had in mind--instead of questioning the outraged customer, they began a friendly conversation with him. The owner--who did not know that the man was an off-duty cop, but now had suspicions--asked if the officers knew him. They responded by pretending they had just met the man and, adding insult to injury, asking the owner to settle the situation without even listening to his side of the story.

This impasse continued until 9:00pm, when the owner got so frustrated he called the police again, this time to report the first group of officers on the scene. Different officers arrived, and the new patrol managed to convince the troublemakers to leave, albeit without any sort of apology. By the time the owner locked up for the night, it was 11:00pm--a full half day after the customer arrived.

The next day the police leadership apologized to the store for the misbehaving officers denying that they knew the co-worker who was causing trouble. That's all they've apologized for so far, however--they claim to be waiting until an investigation is complete to comment on the incident.

The owner--now almost certainly even angrier than the customer--wants to file an official complaint against the officer who disturbed his business and inflicted emotional trauma to his staff. He told JNN that he thinks the police officer should resign, and is too frustrated to stand at the thought off his own taxes going to pay that sort of people.

Sources: ZakZak, JNN, via TBS

Labels: overreactions, police

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Schoolgirl Foils Robbery Attempt

2007-03-22

posted by Akemi

One would-be thief learned the hard way not to take schoolgirls lightly.

Japan has, of late, been plagued by a series of metal thefts. Though stealing raw materials (believed to be for export) seems like an odd sort of crime, in 2006 alone there were 5700 incidents spread across the country totaling 2 billion yen (about US$17 million).

So it wasn't at all unusual when a man was arrested for trying to steal wire from an electrician's storeroom in Itabashi, Tokyo. Except for who caught him: A 17-year-old high school girl.

JNN is reporting that at 1:30am on the 17th of this month, the 17-year-old daughter of an electrician (shown here during the interview) was watching TV in her room on the third floor of her parents' house when she noticed some activity outside. When she saw a man loading six bundles of copper wire and various other components (valued at 11,000 yen - about US$90) from the family business on the first floor into his car, she took action.

The man, who has been charged with attempted theft, runs an electrical business. He told police that he was intending to use the wire in his own business, and he might have succeeded had it not been for one tough daughter.

She rushed downstairs as the man was pulling away, drug him out of his car, and pinned him until the police arrived. More impressive still, she said during the interview with JNN that she doesn't practice any martial art, or even any physical training--she wants to be a kindergarden teacher, not a police officer.

Her description of the incident: "I didn't think I'd be able to catch the man by myself, so I was very surprised. Actually, I'm amazed I did that.

"I got there just as he was pulling away, so I started pounding on the car, then I pulled the guy out of the car and held him. He kept apologizing, like "I'm sorry! Please forgive me!" but I said "No, I won't!""

That's one teen you don't want to mess with.

Labels: crazy news, crime, schoolgirls

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EMTs Busted For Buying Cookies

2007-03-16

posted by Akemi

The national news is reporting on a rather unimpressive misuse of official vehicles in the capital of rural Yamanashi prefecture.

A trio of men manning an ambulance decided to make a quick stop on the way back from dropping a patient off at the hospital. Since it was White Day (the gender-inverted version of Valentine's Day), they wanted to grab some sweets for the ladies. Unfortunately for them, while two of the men ran into the 7-Eleven (yes, those are all over Japan), a bystander took offense at the unofficial use of the flashing lights and tattled on them.

The result was an official reprimand and national media attention ranging from bemused commentary all the way to TV Asahi's online video report, which includes a graphical reenactment (shown here) and a voice-scrambled, anonomized interview with the tattletale himself.

While it may not have been the best idea to leave the lights running while munchy-shopping, it's not exactly a high crime, and you've got to be a pretty serious stick-in-the-mud to photograph the guys shopping and call in to complain.

For those unfamiliar with White Day: The Japanese Valentine's Day tradition is for women to give men chocolate--loved ones as well as less significant male acquaintances like co-workers or classmates. A while ago the candy companies decided that they were missing out on half the market, so they cooked up White Day and advertised the heck out of it. Now, every March 14th, men are obligated to return the favor and give chocolate to women, again both sweethearts and female acquaintances. So these poor guys--who stopped for between 2 and 6 minutes, depending on which report you believe, and reportedly spent all of 900 yen (about US$8) on cookies--probably weren't even going to be giving them to wives or girlfriends.

There's even a term in the Japanese language for this: "giri-choco," meaning roughly "obligation chocolate."

Labels: holidays, humor, overreactions

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