Random Japan

 THE NUMBERS DON’T LIE

  A newly released poll found that 66 percent of Taiwanese people feel ties with Japan have “deepened” since the March 11 disaster.

At the same time, 51 percent said they “plan to refrain from traveling to Japan for the time being.”

An investigation by officials in Saitama uncovered 1,257 cases of welfare fraud in 2011, worth a total of ¥610 million.

A newly unveiled supercomputer at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the US has supplanted a Japanese machine as the world’s fastest. The new record holder, named Sequoia, can process 16.324 petaflops of data. (One petaflop is the equivalent of 1 quadrillion operations per second. Please don’t ask us how many zeros that is.)

stats

    180,000

Number of ayu sweetfish spotted in the Tama River in the spring of 1983, according to a TMG-funded science institute

12,000,000

Number of ayu spotted this spring thanks to improved anti-pollution efforts, according to the institute

¥6 billion

Amount of overseas development aid pledged by Japan during the years 2013-2015

10,000

Number of personnel the government will send abroad during that time to help developing countries make the “transition to a green economy”

FAMOUS FIRSTS

Officials in Akita Prefecture say the Russian government has accepted their offer to present President Vladimir Putin with… a puppy.

The Meteorological Agency says the typhoon that struck Japan last month was only the 11th such storm to hit the mainland in the month of June since recordkeeping began in 1951.

The Okinawa Historical Film Society has released a 57-minute DVD of archival footage from World War II that shows intense fighting between US and Japanese troops. The movie also includes scenes of “how local residents lived in US camps.”

Members of the Sumiyoshi-kai crime syndicate will no longer be able to enjoy free parking in Tokyo after authorities “issued a strong recommendation to ban the gang from further benefiting from the scheme.”

  Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara.

Moron, Racist, Ultra Nationalist  

It’s a Boycott

Of Baseball  

Man Stabs

A Butt  

Gov’t sets new compensation guidelines for Fukushima evacuees



NATIONAL JUL. 21, 2012 – 06:55AM JST

The governmentt on Friday set new compensation guidelines for tens of thousands forced to evacuate an area around the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant last year, with some able to claim the full value of their home.

Victims can claim the pre-disaster market value of a home if it remains uninhabitable for at least six years due to radiation contamination, with half that amount paid to those who return within three years, the ministry of trade and industry said.

The new rules for compensation-most of which will be paid out by plant operator Tokyo Electric Power-also allow for as much as 6.75 million yen in claims for furniture, appliances and other personal belongings.