TOKYO -- The Unification Church has published a protest against Japanese public broadcaster NHK, demanding that it stop airing and apologize for a program dealing with the religious group's recruitment methods.

FUKUSHIMA -- One of the three former Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF) members who have been accused of indecently assaulting then colleague Rina Gonoi denied the allegations in a trial on Sept. 25 and insisted that Gonoi is "lying" about the damage.

KUMAMOTO -- Authorities are calling for caution as the first case of Japanese encephalitis in the country this year has been confirmed in Kumamoto Pre

FUKUOKA -- Police in Fukuoka Prefecture on Sept. 24 issued a prefecture-wide email warning regarding a group of suspicious men wearing a skimpy item of lingerie or nothing at all seen in the city of Koga the previous day.

OSAKA – An American man known for streaming provocative videos has been arrested on suspicion of breaking into a construction site in Osaka, police said Friday.

Ramsey Khalid Ismael, 23, known as "Johnny Somali" on YouTube, was arrested with another American, Jeremiah Dwane Branch, 24, who says he is a university student, according to police.

Ismael's videos include those in which he makes light of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and makes racist comments about Japanese people.

The two men allegedly made an unauthorized entry into a hotel construction site in Osaka's Chuo Ward on Aug. 30 with Branch filming a masked Ismael at the scene, according to the police.

They have told police they will not speak until they see lawyers, police said.

Last few days have been amazing. Here in northern Tohoku, the temperatures went from around 24 overnight down to 15ish. And the daytime temperatures are much more tolerable now at around 25. I am ready for fall.

Did your wages go up? Mine didn't, neither my wife's.

6% is huge. The question is, who benefits?

Many people in Japan depend on the NERV service for earthquake alerts. Unfortunately, they'll no longer be able to receive them on X.

With all the changes that elon the husk made... Now it's going to get harder to get timely info updates during disasters.

Amazon announced monthly prices will increase by ¥100, and yearly prices by ¥1,000.

What do you think? Personally, if it helps drivers get a better wage I am all for it.

I’m used to using conbini-pay with Amazon. You buy the item off the site, it emails you a barcode you take to 7-11 and they scan it and you pay.

I just tried the same with rakuten, except… for the life of me I can’t figure out where to find the stupid barcode! I got an email… but it just shows the item I want and how much it is, no barcode, no other instructions. I’ve logged into rakuten, checked the order, it says to wait for “payment confirmed” but that seems backwards, since I can’t pay until I get the barcode!

Any ideas?

I ran a rather terrifying experiment this month. I, along with my wife, live in a fairly new (~eight-year-old) building. My LDK and office are on my second floor (first is ground floor to me) with some sliding doors to separate them (which are open unless I'm in a meeting). My LDK and office both have an aircon unit. I rarely use the one in my office. My LDK aircon has been on "dry" with the occasional stint on ~22 degrees when it's really hot for a bit. I use the one in my office only when I'm super hot and only for as little as possible.

We also have an aircon on our first (ground) floor in the bedroom. I start it at ~21 most nights and switch to "dry" after an hour. I was dreading our electric bill, but it just came today. From 6/18 to 7/17, we (2 people in 40-amp type A service) used 504 kWh and had a bill of just over 1万4千円.

I was honestly dreading the bill because some aircon units are really bad on a dry setting, but ours were good. I hope you all are staying cool enough in this weather. I thought I'd share in case the data point helps people.

EDIT: 2LDK + Loft, ~54m^2 plus whatever the loft is

It’s summer festival time. Just ate yakisoba at my local festival. It’s ¥400 but the noodles always seems thicker than what the supermarket sells. What gives?

Anyway, what are your go to festival foods?

I was thinking about going for the trail or at least a part of it by bike at some point, but I wondered if anyone here has done something similar before? I'm not religious and would rather do it for the experience and to get to know Shikoku better. I'm not sure whether this would be considered offensive to practicing buddhists in any way and I don't want to disturb people in their religious activities. But it seems like some people have done this by bike before, so maybe it's ok (looking at the paywall of a Japan Times article)?

I'm a moderately fit cyclist, I've done multi-day tours before years ago but not in Japan. So I'm also a bit unsure about steepness and weather conditions. Roads are probably in a decent condition (?) My options are an urban foldable bike (I kind of like that idea) or renting a decent one (probably better in reality).

This was one of the most fun threads in the old place. Any grievances you'd like to air?

Inflation sucks!

In the last year, shredded “natural cheese” had almost doubled in price. The cheap alternatives branded as “97% cholesterol cut shred” are complete ass, and cannot even be legally called cheese.

I was used to paying ¥1,000/kg then ¥1,000/700g for shredded gouda (max value store brand), but now it is ¥1,000/600g cheddar/mozzarella mix.

I have a variety of supermarkets nearby. Also kaldi, Gyomu super, a-price etc. I just don’t want to have to keep buying 1kg bags when it is hit or miss. If you have any solid recommendations please post them here.

Im in Kyushu, but location isn’t important. Any leads are appreciated.