From the CScout Japan blog comes this item about a Japanese restaurant that has goldfish living in its deep fryer. The hot frying oil floats on top of the water while the fish safely swim below it, munching on the scraps of food that sink to the bottom.
Check out the You Tube video here. (Commentary in Japanese, but I think it’s pretty self-explanatory. Especially the “zzzz-zzzzt” phrase uttered by the announcer in the first few seconds. I don’t speak the language, but I assume that’s the international phrase for what happens if the fish try to, ahem, ‘rise above their station.’)
Note to the stupid: Do not try this at home. As the blog and the video explain, the restaurant deep fryer has been specifically modified to not explode when water is added to the hot frying oil.
(Hat tip: Kottke.org)
Hello Kitty: “Cute” or dark symbol of a society in decline?
Skeptics here say Japan’s pursuit of cute is a sign of an infantile mentality and worry that Japanese culture — historically praised for exquisite understatement as sparse rock gardens and woodblock prints — may be headed toward doom.
Hiroto Murasawa, an expert on the culture of beauty at Osaka Shoin Women’s University, believes that cute proves the Japanese simply don’t want to grow up. “It’s a mentality that breeds non-assertion,” he said.
From CNN.
“We have to work too hard and I am always tired. It’s like being in the army. They make us stand still for hours. If we move, we are punished by being made to stand still for longer … We have to work overtime if we are told to and can only go back to the dormitories when our boss gives us permission … If they ask for overtime we must do it. After working 15 hours until 11:30 p.m., we feel so tired.”
Those are the worlds of a female employee at factory in China that manufactuers the iPod Nano. It’s from a investigative report published in the British paper The Mail on Sunday. (The Mail’s report isn’t available online but excerpts can be found at Salon, Macworld, and Ars Technica.)
Since I’ve devoted quite a bit of blog space this past week to the overall economic benefits of sweatshops, I thought it time for some balance.
It also comes at a particularly opportune time, since I’d been not-so-subtly hinting to David about wanting one for my birthday later this month.
[click to continue...]
Hat tip to Asia Pundit for this news item that made my morning:
Kota Kinabalu: The Health Ministry has uncovered a coffee company’s ploy of mixing its coffee powder products with Viagra just to make the coffee extra special.
Deputy Health Minister, Datuk Dr Haji Abd. Latiff Ahmad, said they found this after doing clinical tests on a sample of the ’special’ coffee powder known as “Kopi Kuat” (strong coffee) sold in the market at RM14 per packet.
“We suspected something amiss upon finding out the price of this coffee powder. We then took a sample and sent it to our laboratory for testing and we found it contains Viagra–that’s why it was called Kopi Kuat (strong coffee)’,” he said.
“This particular case arose after the product was registered under the Food Regulations Act. Probably due to strong competition, the company involved put in other additional elements into its coffee powder as to make its coffee more tastier or special. This is what we call a post registration issue,” he said.
