Tag: bears

HMPA Loompa

All
right, now we got to wait for the cough
to subside. I woke up this morning with
a bit of a cough. And of course, like
everyone who gets a cough, my hope is
that I end up with a grally, sexy voice.
But I think really what’s going to
happen is I’m going to get about 30
minutes in and then my voice is going to
get all squeaky and maybe start coughing
a lot, which I I don’t want that for you
to listen to. So, I’m going to do my
best and power through. I was thinking
of skipping today, but I Well, you get
all the personal updates. My on the
computer basically just died on the
weekend. I had to get rid of the old
operating system and then get in a new
operating system and it was very
stressful and I almost bought a new
computer which might have solved my
problems but also not because most of my
problems are emotional.
Anyways, what you’re here for, what I’m
here for, what everyone’s here for is
the Japanese news.
Japanese man scheduled a tweet.
uh
I’m dead and go would be the translation
of it. Uh this is very memeoriented
uh speech.
The would be his death rattle and then
he said I’m dead and then the go which
is a very Japanese meme. Uh there was uh
a baseball player Rodrigo some Dominigo.
So and he embarrassed himself. So this
is almost like you add this to the end
of words when you’re embarrassed. So
he’s basically saying I died. I’m a
little embarrassed about dying or how I
died. And the fact that I’m dead is also
a little embarrassing in itself. So that
is the tweet. In 2023, this guy was 20
years old and he was diagnosed with a
very rare form of cancer. His profile
said, “I like cute girls. I also have
cancer.” So, he was maintaining a sense
of humor about it, which I think we can
all appreciate how hard that must be to
do. So, there is a very bittersweet tone
to all the jokes he’s making about
having cancer and dying. And he still
likes cute girls because he’s a
20-year-old guy.
He scheduled the tweet every day. So,
basically, if he died, he wouldn’t be
able to reschedule the tweet and then
the tweet would go out. So when it went
out,
all these people noticed, but it started
garnering a massive amount of attention
online. And it turns out it set off a
series of people donating usually with
something like
uh here’s my donation go or my
condolences and go and things like that
in reference to this tweet. And they’re
saying 30 to 40,000 donations came in as
a result of this tweet. So it is tragic
that this young man died at a very early
age unfairly of a very rare cancer. Uh
he maintained a sense of humor about it
but it was inspirational enough to
people on the internet. The other meme
like this is the positive side of meme
culture. Other people got the meme, they
joined in on the meme. They got his
feelings right away and they said, you
know, this guy did this. I could donate
some money. And it set off this massive
donations and people want to say thank
you. And honestly, I wish I could do
something as positive with my life.
Bear attacks have been a massive issue
in Japan. Like way more so than I would
have thought. Like when they started
talking about bears coming down from the
mountains into the towns in northern
Japan, that’s a lot. Uh bears are scary.
I grew up in Canada. We learned how to
defend ourselves from bears in the very
realistic way of don’t get involved with
bears. Uh you when I used to walk my dog
in the forest, I used to have put a bell
on the dog and have a bell on me so the
bear would hear the bell and avoid you.
They’re telling kids when they walk home
from school, get a plastic water bottle
and like scrunch it as you walk. And
this is again, you grow up in different
places. I have a friend who grew up in
Florida and he learned about, you know,
being safe from gators. You run
serpentine because gators are very fast
in a straight line, but they’re very bad
at their turns. So basically they must
have like uh stock engine with uh they
haven’t lowered for the turning ratio. I
should have actually thought about that
joke and gotten some words right before
I started it. But there is the rhyme. If
it’s black, fight back. If it’s brown,
stand your ground. And if it’s white,
say good night. So if it’s black, fight
back. So black bears do what’s called a
false charge. So if you when they come
at you, if you kind of like go like
you’re about to fight them, they’ll
often just turn around and run away
saying like, “Oh man, I thought this was
going to be easy and it’s not easy.” If
they charge you and you run away,
they’re like, “Oh well, this worked
out.” So they’re actually just testing
to see if you’ll fight back. Brown bears
are uh stand your ground. So if it’s
brown, stand your ground. And so you
what you want to do is that’s when you
stand, you make yourself big, you make
lots of noise, and you try to scare away
the bear. Uh, basically the bear isn’t
scared of you, but it’s like, nah, that
thing’s way too much trouble to kill and
eat, so I’m just gonna go find something
easier to kill and eat because bears are
fundamentally lazy. I understand bears.
Like, I understand the need and the
desire of bears to want to do the
minimum amount of work because that’s
how I’ve lived my entire life. Uh, if
it’s white, say good night because a
polar bear will just kill you for fun.
Uh, they might not, but it’s completely
up to the polar bear. There’s nothing
you can do to stop it is basically the
idea.
So remember that rhyme. But the problem
is these bears are coming down from the
mountains. They’re hungry. In a previous
episode of Ninja News Japan, I actually
talked about something that I didn’t
know. Farmland used to be a barrier. So
it used to be mountains, sort of forest,
farmland, and then cities. But because
young people are abandoning farming as a
trade, they these there’s a lot of empty
farms. There is now no more cushion. So
the bears come down. There’s no farms.
There’s like emptyow fields. So they
just walk into the city. So there’s no
sort of barrier or transition zone to
keep the bears out of the cities. Now
there are not enough beach nuts.
Basically, apparently in Japan, all the
bears are eating nuts. And if there’s
not enough nuts from the trees and
around the area where they live, they
don’t have enough to get, you know, fat
for the winter. So they start coming
into the city. So this is the problem
that the the crop of nuts that they eat
wasn’t enough this year. So they’re
working their way downs in the city.
This is sounds funny until you realize
13 people have died this year in bear
encounters. Like there’s two 300 people
have been injured but there have been 13
deaths. So this is a very serious thing
like people are dying on a regular basis
whereas before like two years ago zero
there would have been zero bear deaths
in that year. The self-defense force has
offered logistical help because legally
the self-defense force is not allowed to
shoot bears. So this was an interesting
thing. It came up maybe last year, the
year before Ishiba, the previous prime
minister when he was a minister, brought
up the issue of whether you could employ
the self-defense force in Japan against
Godzilla. And it’s because you’re
allowed to employ the self-defense force
for an invading army. Uh, but Godzilla
isn’t an invading army. So, there’s a
couple of movies where Godzilla is
controlled by like aliens. That’s an
invading army. You could use the SDF in
that case. But if it’s just a natural
event, you’re not supposed to be able to
use the SDF. So you have to work your
way around that. So in this case,
they’re offering logistical help and
they don’t have weaponry that would
actually kill a bear. Like that all the
weapons they have designed for the
self-defense force in Japan are for
suppressing fire. So I’m sure it could
still kill you, but that’s not actually
the intent of the weapons that they tend
to carry. So you need the hunters to
kill the bears. and they’re trying to
put in this special emergency rule that
police can carry a gun that would allow
them to also kill bears because they
can’t use the SDF to do it. But the SDF
can come in and help lay traps. They can
do logistics. They can do it like lend
their intelligence to the locals while
they take care of it. Which is a very
interesting problem because they’re
doing this properly. It’s not like Trump
in America who’s just like, I’m going to
roll the National Guard into Portland
cuz I want to. In Japan, it actually
makes more sense. We have literally
people dying. We have literally uh
animals that need to be trapped and
relocated or shot and killed in the
worst case scenarios. They still won’t
do it because legally they’re not
supposed to be able to do that. Uh the U
the SDF can be used for defense
operations. So again, invasion from
another country. Uh public security,
which this is kind of public security,
disaster relief, and civil support. So
in this case, they’re actually offering
civil support. Uh GEU, a different
prefecture a little farther south. in
order to deter bears from entering GEU
have now employed drones that will fly
along the border the northern border of
Gefue and they are making dog barking
noises to scare away the bears. So that
is a interesting technological use of uh
to to try to deter them from coming here
which I find very interesting. Uh
they’re trying to stop the bears by
making it seem like there’s dogs around
but the problem is if you live in one of
those areas and a drone’s flying around
making barking noises all night that’s
problematic in itself. So, I don’t know
if it’s honestly the ideal solution, but
it is better. I don’t actually want the
bears to get shot. I would love if they
were trapped and relocated. I think that
is kind of the more humane way to do it
because they don’t want to come into
town and hurt people. They just like are
surprised, the person surprised, the
bear does what a bear does. It attacks
the thing when it’s surprised. One of
the issues that’s come up on the
internet because the internet is a
cesspool is people have been using AI to
make fake bear videos. So, they’ll have
a fake bear walk through a town and then
they’ll say and then they’ll post it
online going like, “There’s a bear in
this city right now.” And that’s
problematic because people in that city
will now panic. Uh there’s people making
baby bear videos where the bear comes up
and is super friendly, basically just
behaving like a dog, and they hug it and
they can pet it and stuff, but that’s
teaching people that it’s safe to
approach bears, which they don’t want to
do. So, the government’s actually going
to crack down on this version of AI. In
the last episode of Ninja News Japan, I
talked about Japan’s laws on deep fakes
and deep fake porn and stuff like that.
They haven’t actually caught up to the
reality of people making it. So, that’s
problematic. But this is a different
problem. This is a public security,
public health, public safety issue.
They’re going to need rules about that.
It turns out there is already a rule
though that if you do something that
encourages risky behavior or panic,
that’s already illegal in Japan and you
may face prosecution.
Uh, what I read this morning just before
I started Ninja News Japan was that
delivery drivers in northern areas of
Japan where there are bears are delaying
deliveries because they don’t want to
take the chance of running into a bear
by accident.
There’s a new drink in Japan called
water
tokosi which is special water,
functional water. The way it was
translated was functional water, but
when I looked it up, it actually just
said special water, which is a very
Japanese way of naming something. I
think it’s just special stuff. Uh, and
what’s special about this water? Well,
it has hoopas. Uh, h ma. And the idea is
for people who sit at their desks all
day, you get this sort of gut. I
actually have a little bit of one even
though I do exercise pretty regularly.
And it says that if a regular intake of
this kind of water with hoopas will I
guess the hompala loompas go into your
stomach. They redistribute the fat. So,
it doesn’t say this was a very
interesting sort of thing that I
noticed. It didn’t say it gets rid of
the fat or helps you process the fat
faster or something like that. It helps
redistribute the fat. So maybe you got a
little gut, but you’re actually thin
everywhere else, which is something that
happens to people. If it redistributes
that fat equally all over your body,
you’re actually going to look way better
overall. So I’m actually doing running
an experiment. So this month, the month
of November, I am drinking one Tokosi
bottle, which is 600 milliliters, 150
yen, every single day. They have done
testing and it says that if you drink
this regularly, now they don’t say what
regularly is. They don’t say how much it
is. So, I’m doing one bottle a day every
day, but it is supposed to redistribute
the fat around your body. Uh, it comes
from
it comes from a brand from rice included
in this water. I think it’s fermented.
And I It’s one of those things like in
Japan, everything comes from a fermented
bean. All the like health benefits
fermented beans. all this like magic
cures. Fermented beans. Like I’m going
bald. I could probably rub fermented
beans on my head and Japanese people
would say that’s going to make your hair
grow back. I don’t believe it. I don’t
think this is really going to do
anything. I made a mistake of I’m
dieting at the same time as I’m drinking
this water. So, I’m not 100% sure. Like
I could lose the fat in my front because
of the water or I could lo fat in the
front because I’m basically being more
careful about my diet. Again, I don’t
know if it’s going to work. Uh, if you
see me at the end of this month and I
look much more spelt or my clothes are
fitting a little better, maybe it’s the
Humpas, maybe the Humpa Lumpas have done
their job.
Nintendo, the owner of Pokemon, has been
suing Powell World for about 6 months
now. I think it might even be longer
than that. Uh, because Pow World
basically ripped off all the mechanics
of a Pokemon game. So, you want to go,
you collect a monster, use that monster
to fight and do stuff and build it up.
and they decided to make it a little
funnier. They have like depressed ones
and they have ones with weird special
abilities and the evolutions are very
odd. But what Nintendo is suing over is
the actual mechanics of how they capture
the Pokemon, the monsters in Powell
World. And that has been dealt a
significant blow because the Japan
patent office just rejected the monster
capture mechanic as not being original.
Now, there’s lots of games that use
catch this thing, use a capture system,
but they were trying to say this is our
system. We have the patent. We’re the
ones who invented it. Anyone else is
ripping us off. Now, here’s the thing.
If you go back to the beginning of
Pokemon, there were other games doing
the exact same thing, and they actually
copied them. So, nothing in Pokemon to
me is actually original. And that’s not
a terrible thing because obviously
Pokemon did it well. But when you start
suing someone else for ripping off the
thing that you ripped off, I actually am
like, “Hey, maybe you’ve overstepped a
little bit. Maybe you don’t really know
what you’re doing.” Uh, some of the
references to other games that are doing
something similar like the Monster
Capture, they said Monster Hunter, Ark,
Kenti Collection, Pokemon Go. Pokemon Go
is actually made by a different company
than Nintendo. So technically, Pokemon
Go would be guilty of ripping off the
systems that are used in Pokemon, which
is a very interesting problem to have
because if you successfully sue POW
World, you could then actually go after
Pokemon Go and successfully win. But
they’re saying because these are used
systems are used in other games, in
other systems, that it’s not really
original. It’s not your mechanic. Uh,
and that actually means they might not
win their lawsuit.
Super Senti series. Super Sententi
series. Super Sententi series has been
going for 50 years. So I’m 53 right now
as of recording of this podcast, which
means I was three years old when the
first uh Power Rangers is how you would
probably know it show was started in
Japan. And every year they swap out with
new characters, new people, a new team,
a new theme. Like my kid went through
the same process where he like fell in
love with the bug one. I actually really
wish it wasn’t the bug one. They had
bugs and trains and trucks and all these
other things that kids, little primarily
little boys is the target audience, but
things that they like and that gets
integrated into the suit and their
powers and whatnot. But the originals
were just like the real basic five
colors, the fivecolor team and they’re
all different people and they all have
different problems. Uh Jade has just put
in, damn, you’re as old as I was when I
had my first crush, the pink ranger. You
see, here’s the thing.
Being me who I am, I was into the yellow
ranger. And the yellow ranger when they
turned into the Japanese part was a suit
was actually a spelt young man which
gave me very confused feelings when I
was a teen in watching Power Rangers.
But I watched Power Rangers. I was
really too old for it. I just thought it
was really interesting that how they’d
cut a Japanese TV show into the American
actors. But Triny
had a thing for Triny. I had a
girlfriend at the time and she was a
little disturbed by that.
But it’s coming to an end next year
which is actually really sad. Any show
that lasts 50 years is kind of an
institution. Basically, everyone in
Japan has grown up with some version of
Power Rangers in their life, the Super
Senti. The sales of all the extra stuff
is waning, which is showing a lack of
interest in the series. And that’s
probably where they make all their
money. Like the show itself has always
been really cheap. And they actually
kind of never brought it up a level in
quality because
that’s how they made their money. They
made this cheap show and then they sold
all the stuff and all the stuff sold and
that made them all the money they made
to make more shows. That’s how it lasted
50 years. It was a solid plan. People
are buying less and less. The last
series is called number one sentuger
gauer. I don’t know how to say that.
It’s G O Z Yu G- Raziger. They always
choose really weird names. Sometimes
they come from like German or something
else. I’m probably saying this not
butchering it just in English,
butchering it in multiple versions of
the languages. Uh is going to finish
next year. It’s going to be the last
one, but I guess if you’re gonna end
your show, doing it on the 50-year mark
is pretty solid.
Heroins is a group of idol groups. So,
that’s already like an inception of idol
groups. So, you have heroins is made up
of smaller bands that probably come
together to be a super band every now
and then, much like our previous store
story Super Senti. Um, run by a company
called Imaginate. Now, Heroins Ken Qus,
I think that’s the name of the band. Uh,
there’s a 17-year-old member who has
been let go because of severe
contractual violations, but they didn’t
give any details. So, they went on
Twitter. They said, “Here we have this
17-year-old girl. Uh, we’re cutting her.
She’s she’s broken her contract.” Now,
they posted just this on Twitter. She’s
not going to be part of our band
anymore. Now, everyone’s trying to
figure out why is she getting fired.
Well, she’s getting fired because she
posted a picture of the snacks she had
when she was going to a movie. Now, in
the clear plastic cup cover of her Coke,
uh, you could see a reflection of a male
figure. And then fans immediately
deduced that that male figure must be
her boyfriend. She was going on a date.
You’re not supposed to go dating when
you’re in one of these idol bands.
You’re not supposed to have a
relationship or a life outside of the
band. You’re supposed to say stay
weirdly available for the fans to live
this fantasy like they could have you in
their life. and that’s all part of the
contract, but it isn’t because it was
made illegal. So, they’re not allowed to
say that anymore, but they are still
able to like find another reason to fire
you. So, they think because she was seen
in public with a boy, but again, the
fans are so creepy, they’re like zooming
in on the reflection of her cup to see
who she’s with, they fired her for that.
That’s the assumption. Now, we don’t
know if that’s actually true, but I’m
betting it’s actually true because once
it came out that she probably has a
boyfriend, 17-year-old girl meets a guy,
she’s going to go on dates with the guy.
I think that’s really normal for
17-year-old kids to do. I have no
problem with it. But I’m not a freaky
freaky idol fan. Freaky freaky idol fans
want to keep this idea that their idol
is pure and waiting for them in some
way, which is how you end up with these
really weird parasocial relationships
between the idols and the fans where
they’re not allowed to have a life
outside of the group. A lot of people
were like, they should have just lied
and said like it was her bodyguard, it
was her manager, it was her brother or
someone else because no one else
actually knows who this guy is. But I
saw the picture of the reflection. It
was really hard to see. So you couldn’t
make out who it was. So they could have
said, “Yeah, she went to a movie with
her brother. She went to a movie with
her manager and then just covered up
that way.” But they do have these rules
and they’re trying to say that these the
government’s saying like you can’t tell
people they’re not allowed to have
relationships anymore. You’re not
allowed to put that in the contract, but
they can still not put it in the
contract. tell them they can’t do it and
then if they do it, fire them, which is
what exactly seems to have happened to
this poor young woman who just wanted to
sing songs and have a life.
So, we have our new prime minister,
Takahuchi, and I am still really torn as
to whether I’m on board or not because
she said a lot of stuff that I disagree
with. She she doesn’t want to maintain
the work life balance that’s already
been established in Japan. She actually
wants to make it worse instead of making
it better, which I am very pro- work
life balance because I think the people
in Japan work unnecessarily long hours.
I don’t think they’re more productive. I
don’t think this is actually the
solution. And it again, baby problem,
all that other stuff goes into it as
well. I’ve said this a million times. I
don’t really want to say it anymore.
When she was on the campaign trail, she
said it she wanted to revise the public
servant renumeration law and cut cabinet
members salaries, including her own. And
one of her first things she’s going to
do is cut her own salary and then cut
the salaries of all the cabinet members
that work for her. And so she’s not your
So there’s lawmakers in Japan and then
there’s cabinet members and they
actually have different renumeration
package packages. Cabinet members often
get a lot of bonuses and extras because
you know they travel and they do extra
stuff. She’s saying cut all that out.
You get your pay and nothing else.
There’s no bonuses. There’s no benefits.
Lawmakers and cabinet members should
make the same amount of money including
herself. I have a lot of respect for
that. She’s actually made a promise.
She’s keeping the promise. And the
promise is technically hurting her and
the people who work for her, but that
means we’re spending less money,
taxpayer money, on the people who are in
power. I’m really on board with that.
So, I’m really torn. This might be a
case where this is like a real life
situation where she has good points and
bad points. I’m just hoping at the end
of the day she has more good points and
we get to see more of those later.
Uh DL site is a kind of spicy little
website that I’ve mentioned before. Uh I
mentioned before in a previous episode
when we were talking about Mastercard
and Visa trying to do what would be
called financial censorship. So
basically, if you run a website that
does uh specific documentaries about the
reproductive cycles of humans, uh you
would not be able to use credit cards,
Mastercard or Visa on your sites because
they’ll say like we don’t want to
promote that. Our advertisers don’t want
to be connected to that. So you can’t
use your card discard system unless you
get rid of all the porn. This site, DL
site, wanted to resist these censorship
efforts, which I okay, I think if you
want to look at it, you should be
allowed to look at it. It’s just that
simple. So, I don’t think there should
be a lot of censorship as long as
everyone involved is consenting. Like,
if they’re consenting adults, they want
to do it. They can do it. Uh, I don’t
agree with manipulation.
That’s a lot harder. It’s a much grayer
zone. So, they they have decided, okay,
we’re not going to use Visa Mastercard
because they want to censor us. So, what
we’re going to do is create our own
essentially internet coin that you can
use. So, you can buy credits and you can
use those credits towards actually
buying content on that website. They
have just come out with a Twitter clone.
So, it’s called Pomu and Pomu is
basically a Twitter feed and it’s a
friendly secret hangout for otaku. Now,
it’s not really secret because they just
advertised it, but they’re trying to
integrate like a social service, so a a
social website into their other
services. And of course, you can use
their coin on both. Now, this has been a
very friendly website to people who make
a certain kind of art. art depicting
maybe,
how can I say in the most gentle terms,
uh, the human form. It does have a nice
thing though, one feature. So, up in the
top right corner, it has a little
button, and it’s a little button where
you can toggle R18, which is restricted
to 18-year-olds and not. So, you can
basically have a safe for work and not
safe for work button, you can turn on
and off. Apparently, when you turn off
the not the safe for work button and
turn it on to not safe for work, the
feed changes dramatically. But again, if
that’s what you want to look at and
everyone’s consenting, I’m on board with
it. I think you should be allowed to do
that. Apparently, the website has
already been flooded with, and I put
this in quotation marks, art, and I’m
sure there is a lot of art. Uh, you can
register with a Vivian ID, which is part
of their alternate payment solution. Uh,
they’re creating a whole sort of corner
of the internet that isn’t ruled by
censorship, isn’t ruled by Visa,
Mastercard, or this financial
censorship. And while I probably won’t
spend a lot of time on that website, I
am all for it existing.
78-year-old man had an obsession with a
woman in her 20s.
And I I just I worry that I’m going to
be that 78-year-old man. I’m in my 50s.
I’ve held it together so far, but I’ve
done so many stories about men in their
mid50s who just lost their and just
started doing weird weird stuff. I’m
like, is it an inevitability? Am I going
to be that guy? Maybe I make it through
my 50s and it happens to me in my 60s,
but it looks like this dude in his 70s,
late 70s, exactly the same issue. He’s
known her for about two years, and he
says he developed feelings for her. He
was already arrested for breaking into
her home and stealing perfume. So, that
shows the weird level of obsession that
this guy already has. He had done this.
He’d been arrested for it. He got in
trouble for it, but he still had these
feelings for her. So, how does he
express his feelings? But let’s say
let’s say age gap isn’t the problem.
Let’s say that he does have a chance.
You have to show your sincere and honest
love for someone. What is the one thing
you can do that will generally have them
change their opinion about you, make you
think you’re a better person? He set her
car on fire. And then when he was
arrested, he said, “I’m dissatisfied
with being arrested.” Which is a very,
very entitled old Japanese man thing to
say. I have just set a woman’s car on
fire because I find her attractive and
she’s not returning my affection despite
the 50year age gap, which should be
enough to explain why she’s not as into
you as you think she should be. I mean,
let’s say I’m in a situation like that.
I look at someone way younger than me
and I find them attractive. I’d be like,
my first thought is they will not find
me attractive. They would have to come
with a sign that says, “Chunk beef
chest, I find you attractive.” and that
it’ be like,
“But are they telling the truth?” So
that self-doubt is actually a benefit
when you get into these older years
where you could be doing really weird,
dangerous stuff and just letting the
obsessive aspects of your life take
over. Because this guy, he’s 78, I’m
assuming retired, has a lot of free
time. He’s just sitting around
obsessing. And that’s where this has
gone wrong. Totally. But then when he
gets arrested to complain about the fact
he got arrested because he set a woman’s
car on fire. I’m dissatisfied with being
arrested. I think he should not be
allowed out anymore.
Two teens were arrested, 17 and 18 year
olds, for a fishing scam. Every episode
of the last like five, six months has
had a scam story involved in Engineers
Japan because it is just it’s taking
over the country. uh they found people
online and they would say, “I’m looking
for a companion to go to an idol
concert.” So, they’re targeting a very
specific group that has uh money to
spend on things like idol concerts.
Uh they said, “Let’s talk about how to
pay for the tickets. I’ll get the
tickets. Uh I’ll send you one yen on our
like uh payment system so you can get
like it’s a real address. It’s legit.”
And then you put the money in to this
fake website. and they put the money
into the fake website and that’s how it
collected their credit card information
and then the teens could take the credit
card information and then drain their
bank accounts from one account they
drained 500,000 yen. So the 17-year-old
would transfer the money from their
account to the other kid’s account
uh and they seem to have got this is not
a confirmed number but at least 13
million yen in total. So this was a very
very successful scam. The thing is
they’ve used a lot of AI tools to create
the website. So they created a website
that looks real. They’ve created used
the tools to make stuff that makes it so
that they can collect the information
and it’s made it very easy because they
can basically just go into AI. I bet
you’re not allowed to say I want to make
a fishing site, but you could say I want
to make a site that looks like this that
has this aspect and it just builds it
for you and then you just post it on the
internet and then now that it’s been
shut down, they can go make another one
in a few minutes because they have AI do
it for them. The 17-year-old is the
better criminal. I’ll be very honest. He
said, “I don’t remember the incident.”
So, he’s just saying, “I ignorance. I
don’t know. You have to do your job as a
police officer and prove the crime. I’m
not going to help you with that.” The
18-year-old, not as good a criminal. He
admitted fault right away.
85year-old man grabs another guy and
tries to stab him who’s 65 years old.
So, he’s the younger person in this
because he had been sent to take money
from him. Except that guy was actually
just going to work. So, the old dude,
86-y old, knocks over the 65year-old and
tries to stab him a couple times. So,
the guy ends up with his hand up. So, he
gets some minor defensive wounds. Uh, an
offduty cop happened to be jogging in
the morning doing his morning workout.
He saw this and intervened. Turns out
the guy had a kitchen knife in his right
hand as he was attacking the 65-year-old
and two more knives in his left hand.
So, he had again hit this weird paranoid
level. He he had hit this weird paranoia
just kind of like our previous old guy
story where he’s like all up in his head
and he’s now thinks that’s reality where
the reality is no one’s coming to take
your money but he is so locked in that
this guy’s coming to take my money he
brought three knives with him. I don’t
know how you’re holding two knives in
one hand like is it one blade out of
each one? Is it like just two so that if
you drop the hand that drop the knife
that in your in your dominant hand you
can just swap out really quick? He
clearly walked out of his house that
morning wanting to stab stab somebody
for something and then had this weird
paranoia. So the police arrested him.
He’s not made any comment other than he
thought that that man was sent to take
money from him. So like some kind of
fishing scam. But that guy was just
walking to work that day and he got
attacked by a knife. So luckily no one
was really hurt. He got again a couple
cuts on his hands and stuff, but nothing
that was like life-threatening or
particularly dangerous. He’s going to
heal from that just fine. No problem.
the mental trauma. I mean, you get
tackled by an 86 year old and you have
to fend him off because he has multiple
knives in his two hands. That is a scary
way uh to live. And be careful out there
of everyone, especially old Japanese
men.

Podcast Name de wa nai

(upbeat music)

Japan’s having a lot
of issues with tourists,

and it’s over tourism, but at
the same time, the problem is

Japan really wants people to come
to Japan and spend their money.

The weak yen is actually making it

so that people can
come here and spend a lot

more money, which is
good for the economy.

They are finding, though, that again,

these cultural issues
tend to crop up regularly,

and so now cities are
starting to make some changes.

Shibuya, probably famous
for being a party place.

They banned drinking at Halloween,
so you weren’t allowed to drink in public.

A lot of people, when they
come to Japan, most places

they come from, you’re
not allowed to drink in public.

I’m Canadian.

You’re not allowed to just walk
down the street and drink alcohol.

In Japan, that is technically legal.

That doesn’t mean it’s acceptable,

like it doesn’t mean you
should be doing it all the time.

I have found when I first came, and
when other foreigners first come to Japan,

they’re like, “It’s legal,
therefore it’s acceptable,

“therefore I can
do it all the time.

” So they have like a drink
on the train, they have a drink

on the walk home, they’re
having drinking constantly outside.

It is fun and exciting.

Japanese people tend to have
limits, like, “Okay, we’re going

to have a picnic, “we’ll have
some drinks with our picnic.

“We’re taking the shinkansen.

“It’s appropriate to drink
a beer on the shinkansen.

“That’s kind of like
a tradition almost.

” So you run into,
yes, it is legal to drink

in public, but is it
socially acceptable?

And the foreign people come here and they’re
basing their decisions on what is legal,

not necessarily what
is socially acceptable.

Not massive problems until,
of course, it gets out of hand.

Shibuya drinking in public,
it’s gotten way out of hand.

2019, they did a small-scale
version on Halloween,

because the previous year
there was basically a riot.

They, I think, pushed over a car, set
a car on fire, don’t remember exactly,

but they damaged property, they
smashed some windows and stuff.

It just went way too far.

This wasn’t foreigners, though.

Like foreigners were certainly included,
but this was 90% Japanese people.

So at first, it was just Halloween.

Then it was Halloween and New Year’s.

And now they’ve decided it’s not going
to be just Halloween and New Year’s.

It’s going to be all year round.

They’re making a larger
punishment area, so basically all of

Shibuya, it sounds like you will
not be allowed to drink in public.

So what happens?

Japan has a very interesting
way of dealing with laws.

There’s no official punishment for getting
caught drinking in public in Shibuya,

because you haven’t
changed the national law.

It’s just been prohibited locally.

So if a police officer approaches you

and you have like a can of
beer and drinking the can of beer,

he’s going to ask you to have the beer and
he’s going to pour it out in the street.

This is actually what happened.

I remember this, I was a teenager,

and if we went downtown
in Ottawa for Canada today,

you could see a stream of alcohol, like
combined alcohol, just running down the road.

‘Cause the cops would
basically walk around, find people,

usually underage people or
teenagers and stuff, drinking, they

would take the drinks, they
would just pour it out of the street.

They didn’t issue fines,
no one got arrested.

They’re just like, look,
you’re not allowed to do that.

Losing the alcohol you brought with
you was probably punishment enough.

It’s not even all day, it’s
technically only in night.

So it’s between 6 p.m. and 5 a.m.

Which means if you really
want to push the limits

of what’s acceptable with
this rule, you could go and

have lunch drinks in Shibuya
and get wrecked in public.

I don’t know if that’s what you want to do.

If you want to be one of those people,

so now I’m expecting
honestly a live streamer to go

and get super drunk
in the middle of Shibuya

in the middle of the day
and then when the police

approach I’m going to
ask him, what’s going on?

He says like this is legal,
you can’t stop me, ha ha.

I’ve found the loophole and
then they’re going to get you

for a public disturbance
or obstruction of business.

I mean, they just go for the
classic obstruction of business.

But what they’re actually
doing by not making

a punishment, they’re testing out
like how effective this is going to be.

Do we need to make punishments?

Because if this works, people,
you just walk up and be like,

hey, you know how to
drink, please give me a drink,

I’ll pour it out in the
street, thanks on your way.

If that’s enough, they’re
not going to make it anymore.

But if it isn’t, then
they’ll start doing fines.

Then they’ll start doing jail time.

Then they’ll start increasing
punishments over time.

And that’s how Japan
tries to find a balance

between the rules
they’re making and reality.

So they’re hoping that they
don’t have to do anything.

They’re hoping that, okay,
here’s a rule, follow the rule.

No one gets in trouble,
nothing happens, that’s great.

But realistically speaking, people are
going to immediately try to push the limits.

As we’re going to hear in
our gubernatorial election

section later on, which is just people
trying to push the limits across the board.

Welcome to the quiz.

Yes, I need to get some no-pass.

My concern is I know that you
have paid attention to the news.

So you may have read that
this is actually something

I haven’t thought
about is I have to, like,

check that my participants have not pre-read
the news that I’m going to talk about.

But there was a thing called
the Ninja certification exam.

Have you heard about that?

Has it a Ninja new certification?

No, completely unrelated.

I am planning on suing.

No, I haven’t heard of the
Ninja certification exam.

And just to put your
mind at ease, I often read

the headline and don’t
actually read the details.

I waited on the podcast.

Honestly, that’s even better, because
then we can talk about the details.

So there’s a thing it’s called
the Ninja certification exam.

It’s a written test.

There are three levels that
cover history and ninjitsu.

So I’m assuming the history of
ninjitsu is not just history in general.

And then ninjitsu, which I
don’t know, like how to disappear

in a cloud of smoke, I’m not
actually sure what that entails.

I haven’t been allowed
to take the exam yet.

The question is, what could
you do to earn extra points

at the lowest level,
the lowest level ninjas

or want to be ninjas could do
something to earn extra points?

There are three options, OK?

A, hit a target with a shoot again.

A B, cosplays a ninja.

Or C, cast a spell using kuji kiri, which
is those Naruto hand gesture things.

Do you know what I mean?

No.

Oh, like the– Yeah,
yeah, exactly that.

You were just doing rings,
but it’s usually like pointy

fingers and then curl
your fingers in a monkey.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of
that stuff, a lot of that stuff.

So you could hit a
target with a shoot again,

you could cosplays a ninja, or you
could cast a spell to get extra points.

What do you think they did to give the
lowest level potential ninjas extra points?

You can ask questions, we can have a chat.

Yeah, what kind of spells
are we talking about?

Well, it’s like a joke spell.

So it’s you cast a spell on
the examiner for extra points.

So it’s, again, even like
cosplay and even hitting a target

with a shoot again,
they’re all kind of jokes.

Right, OK.

And this– is this ninja school– is
it just for– is that a two-ish thing?

Like a wee– My belief, because
the article was a little weird,

because it said they
had the exam, but didn’t

actually technically
say what the exam for.

But I know in like Iga,
there’s the ninja village.

And they have tour guides
who dress up as ninja.

I went to visit it.

And they have like the female ninja,

whereas a bright pink uniform,
which I was like, that’s not hiding at all.

But they have like a ninja show.

And then Iga Castle has
like a ninja house they’ve

built that shows like the
hidden passages and stuff.

So there are tourist opportunities.

And I know some towns that
like claim to have the origins

of ninja or the area, they’ll
have like shows and tourist bits.

So I think that’s what it was for, because
you have to be able to explain stuff.

Right, OK.

So it’s training to be
sort of a tour guide.

My initial sort of thought was
it would be hitting the target.

Hitting the target would shoot again.

That was my initial thought.

Because I thought I’ve been to Iga as well.

And they dragged me in another
gadget out of the audience.

Like, oh, these, you know, these
gadgets won’t be scared of taking part.

And I had to throw a thing at a thing.

Yeah.

So did you hit it?

No, no, way more important.

Forget the quiz.

How did you do it?

Oh, good.

Because at Iga Castle, I went there too.

I took my mom and you got
three shots with the shooting can.

If you hit the bullseye, you got a t-shirt.

So it was actually surprisingly hard.

I got the t-shirt.

It was a medium.

But I didn’t complain.

I was happy to win a free t-shirt.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, I did it.

And I stuck in the thing in the target.

That’s pretty good.

The guy said that was so goy.

Sorry, I should not mean I could
potentially be the training ninja.

Well, you could take the test at least.

The written test.

Of course, it’s a written test.

It being Japan, there’s
always a written test.

There’s always a written test.

Yeah.

Cosplay is an ninja.

Cos, that’s just that’s just
putting on a ninja costume.

Yes, it’s a super Japanese
thing to do, though.

So it is, but is that worth extra points?

It seems like he’s just giving
someone three points at that for that.

There’s no actual skill or
anything involved, is there?

I personally think
that’s the lamest option.

So I’m going to, I’m going
to, no, it’s definitely not that.

Cos it’s just, cos you
would have to show you

they’ll have to wear an ninja
costume to be in the ninja school.

You already went.

So, yeah, you’re getting
three points just to turn up.

It’s just going to be the hand
gesture or the target thing.

This is some heavy
thinking we got going on.

Yes.

Straticizing.

So I was dragged down
the crowd and got to do it.

And there’s no, no lower
level than ninja than me.

Yes.

And the book… I hope it’s not
insulting that I agree that quickly, man.

I’m wearing black.

Yeah.

But the hand gesture
thing does take a bit

of coordination and thoughts and
studying to learn how to do the hand moves.

I, as a joke, tried to learn
some of the hand moves.

There are 81 hand symbols
and nine primary ones.

So if you learn the nine primary
ones, there’s combinations.

And just as a joke, I tried to learn
one or two, so I could do it to kids.

And I honestly couldn’t do it.

My fingers are not nimble enough.

So that sounds like
it’s higher level than…

I felt like that was actually kind of hard.

Which makes me think back
to my gut reaction of the target.

But then again, Japan is a safety country.

Are they going to let
basic trainees do that?

I’m going to start hucking stuff around.

I’m going to go with
my initial gut reaction,

while I’ve hit in the target
with a shooting camp.

Where is this?

Right.

You are incorrect.

It is B.

It is the lamest one.

If you cosplay doesn’t ninja, you got
extra points on your ninja written exam.

So there’s all these potential
tour guides sat in a thing, in

a classroom somewhere, taking
a written exam dressed as ninjas.

Yeah.

I mean, if they put the effort in, it would
be weird to me if you were going to go for

that exam to not put
that effort in, though.

But it was also only the low level ones.

I guess there’s an
expectation that the

higher level ones are
doing, because there

are three levels,
which I would like an ex.

This is the problem with some
of this news, is there’s only so

much explanation that goes
into these sort of fluff stories.

But if you pass the exam, you get
a scroll and the title, “Cocan Ninja.

” Nice.

So you get to call yourself “Cocan
Ninja” for the rest of your life, I assume.

Surely.

Well, unless they have
the test on a different

day, or it’s not in
the actual ninja, ninja,

ninja series stuff area, it’s
in that kind of office building.

There was a picture, and
it looked like a classroom.

Right.

So I bet it’s just like
a tourist office, and

they have like a conference room, and
they throw them in the conference room.

That would be my guess.

There is an extra point, though,
so you can try to make up for it.

How many participants, middle of that?

How many participants do you
believe participated in the ninja exam?

It would include all three levels.

Are all three levels all written?

What they were talking
about is the answer is yes.

It was an exam.

There were three levels
of the written exam.

Thank you.

How many, so how many sought the test?

How many, so all one big group, how many
people do you think were in that group?

I’m going to say 47.

47.

How did you came to that note?

How did you come to that number?

Well, I think it’s Japan-wide.

It is Japan-wide.

Twoism is booming, so
there’s probably a need

for people dressed as ninjas,
plastic ninja stars around.

Yep.

I agree with all that.

So there’s probably already quite a lot of
ninjas who are already trained, and I know

that a company that
I used to work for

usually brought in around
100 teachers a year.

Mm-hmm.

So I’m going to say
half of half of that about.

That’s what that was my thinking.

It is 124.

Ah, I thought a lot
of ninjas had a whole

clan of ninjas, but they
might not hold past though.

That is true.

We don’t get the failure rate.

I was trying to look
up for any sort of

results, but once they’ve written
their piece, they can move on.

So I didn’t get how
many actual ninjas passed

the exam, because we have
no idea if it’s a hard exam or not.

When they say history, it
would be pretty easy to fail the

history part if you didn’t
take history very seriously.

And then in Jitsu part, who
knows what they’re asking on that?

Yeah.

And, yeah, Kenji might
have turned up and he

might have forgotten his ninja
costume, and he didn’t eat it.

Yeah, he didn’t get those extra points.

He was always two points shy,
and then he didn’t wear his costume.

You know, if you’re
going to be a ninja,

you’re going to need to get over the
shyness of wearing a ninja outfit, I think.

Well, once you’re a real ninja,
no one will ever see you again.

That’s true.

I figured the high
level for extra points,

you have to turn in your exam
without anyone seeing you.

Haha, yeah.

It just appears.

I don’t want you to come from.

Yeah, yeah.

You’ve got to manage to
get to back home through

an elaborate underground tunnel
system without anyone knowing?

Without anyone knowing.

Yeah.

I was like, I wonder if
other countries have

like like there’s a
like the Italy has like

a little Roman region air school,
because all those places need.

They need people to dress up.

Yeah.

Because Canada has
Edmonton, Edmonton has

this like rodeo festivals, one
of the biggest things in Canada.

So they got to have people
dressed up as cowboys.

Now, in that area,
people dress up as

cowboys anyways, but I’m
assuming there’s no actual exam.

Japan to me is a
very like, let’s make a

paper exam for it,
because I think in Calgary

stampede, which is
what this festival is

called, they’re getting
actual people who

work with cows, like
they’re actual cowboys.

I did judo in Canada, I
came here and I wanted

to do some tests here
to get a higher level.

There’s a paper test in Japan.

There’s no paper testing, Canada, you go
out and you do fights and you do like this

like presentation thing
of showing how to do

something really, really
well, and then they grade you.

In Japan, you do those two things and you
sit for a paper test, which is all Japanese

and really hard old kunji, which
I couldn’t read, so I gave up.

What’s this?

There’s always a test.

It’s always a paper
test, it’s such a Japanese

thing to do, taking a sport
and making a paper test.

I’ve had students in
the past, they wanted

to be tour guides, take
like a world heritage

site test, yeah, but
you’re going to be talking

about in Japan, why do you need to learn
about the Taj Mahal, maybe they can do

comparisons, they go,
here’s our castle, it’s like

the Taj Mahal of Japan,
which is what they

would do in Japan, they’d always
be comparing it to something else.

Look at this Edo
wall, it’s just like the

great wall of China,
it’s a really good wall.

All right, well thank you
for your participation,

your participation in the
test, we’ll count that up.

I actually have to start keeping track of
success and failure rate of this, but yeah,

thank you for your help, no
problem, thank you, all right.

Being about tourists, he made
you castle, fairly famous castle.

Last year had 1.48 million visitors, so
that’s a lot of people, and they make a lot

of money, because all those people
pay money to go see the castle.

450,000 of those people
were foreign tourists,

now I didn’t take time
to do the statistics,

and it was like a million
Japanese people and

half a million foreigners, that’s
going to do very rough math.

The current entry fee to the
castle is 1,000 yen for everybody.

The mayor is suggesting
that foreigners only

pay 3,000 yen for
entry, and a lot of people

are saying, why would you
charge foreigners more?

This is one of the
issues that’s going on

restaurant, some
restaurants are deciding to

charge foreign people
more, we did a story

previously where if you
were a foreign person, there

was a foreign menu
with a foreign price, and

then a local menu with a local price, and
it’s divisive, because is it acceptable to

force someone who isn’t Japanese to
pay more money for the exact same service?

The mayor’s justifying
this suggestion by

saying he’s comparing
it to the Louvre or spots

in Egypt, so the Louvre
apparently, if you’re

local, it’s free, and if you’re
foreign, you have to pay.

I don’t know about
Egypt, but I’m assuming,

again, foreigners have
to pay a certain amount

of money to go see
things in Egypt, whereas

maybe locals pay a Louvre fee, similar
to what he suggested for his major castle.

He’s also justifying
it by saying they need

money for maintenance, but there is a concern
that it may turn off foreigners, so if

foreigners find out they
pay more money for this

attraction where locals pay
the same amount of money,

well then I’m not going
to go to that attraction.

It’ll actually take away potentially half
a million visitors a year, so is it worth

increasing their price
for less people to show

up, and maybe less
making less money overall.

It’s very hard to tell.

It will be interesting to see, A, do they
go through with it, because they’re just in

the discussion phase
now, or B, do other

places start taking on
this model where then

any tourist who comes
to Japan suddenly is

paying more for everything, as opposed to
paying the same price everyone else pays.

And then I’m in the Union situation
where I’m a resident of Japan.

What do they do with me?

Because I’m a white guy,
do I have to pay more?

Because I live in Japan, I live in Japan
for a long time, do I pay the Japanese fee?

How do you know the difference?

I do have a residential card.

So I have a identification that says I live
in Japan, I live in Japan for a long time.

That probably would
be enough to get me to

the local rate, but I could see myself
getting annoyed that they even suggested.

Even though again, quite
obviously, I am not Japanese.

We’re going to talk about bears.

Bears have actually cropped
up a lot in stories recently.

Bears versus Japan.

There was a town.

It’s a small town and they have
basically a Hokkaido in all these places.

They have like hunters associations.

These are the people
who legally own firearms.

They can go out and
hunt animals and that would

include bears that have
encroached on society.

So you got bears coming
into towns, you need

someone to scare away or worst
case scenario, actually kill the bear.

These are the guys you got to call.

You got to pay these guys.

Now hunting a bear,
fighting a bear essentially

is dangerous and this
town and the hunting

association closely related to that
town could not come to an agreement.

They wanted to give
them 3000 yen danger pay.

So they’re like, “Hey, we want you
to go face this very angry, hungry bear.

” I’ll give you 30 bucks.

It’s one of those
things, it’s like as dare

you’re like, “Well,
that’s not enough money.

” Like if I get mauled by the bear, 3000
yen isn’t going to do that much for me.

It’s not really worth it.

So now they’re in the weird situation where
they are not going to protect the town.

Now I guess you call
the cops, but the cops

again, they have
very small pistols and

they’re not equipped
to really take on a bear.

So that means the
bear now in this town has

free rein in a different
city in Fukui, a bear

entered a house and the woman called
the cops and she crawled out of window.

So the bear, it sounds like
came in through the front door.

Maybe the front door wasn’t
locked or the front door was left open.

It is getting close to summertime.

It’s hot.

Maybe trying to get some
air flow through whatever.

I have no idea why or how
the bear got in the house.

The woman calls the cops and
then she, she haulsed it out of window.

Pretty good move on her part.

I don’t know if she did a flip.

I don’t know why I suddenly thought that.

It’d be cool to flip
out the window as you

run away, but it’d be
even cooler to backflip.

So the cops then surround the house.

They’re on standby outside the house.

That was it.

There was no follow up.

They don’t say how long they’re on standby.

They don’t say anything happens.

So if we take this
story at face value, those

cops are still standing
outside that house.

And I guess that bear just
owns that house now, be weird.

We see our houses as safe places.

That’s kind of the whole point of a house.

Then once a bear is
come into your house and

he’s lived in your
house for maybe as long

as you have because he’s
apparently not left the house.

What happens then?

Do you feel safe in your house anymore?

Do you get like, I’m going
to lock the doors all the time?

That kind of thing?

Who knows?

Yeah, I don’t know how I’d feel.

I don’t deep sleep.

When I was a little
kid, my dad made me a

bedroom in the basement,
which was really cool.

He liked to build stuff.

I like to be slitter
apart from the family

because I was a
rebellious, weird little kid.

I was like nine years old.

But that meant my bed was sitting
under one of those little basement windows.

If you were going to
break into a house, you’d

generally go in through one of
those little basement windows.

There was one night I was in
bed and a man stepped on my head.

He came in through the window,
came down, stepped on my head.

I screamed or freaked out and he ran away.

Very technically nothing
happened, but also someone

broke into the house
and stepped on my head.

Since then, fairly
traumatic experience, I

think that’s fair to
say, I do not deep sleep.

Any sound that happens
during the night, I

will wake up and this
is like 40 years later.

And that’s it.

It’s just the rest of my life.

I’m assuming till I die, I will
be an incredibly light sleeper.

I will never know what it is to deep
sleep ever again because of that.

So I’m wondering if this woman maybe has a
similar situation with her bear experience,

or if maybe now she
just knows she’s going to

lock all the doors, how
do you be more careful?

It’s a bear.

So you’re walking along the coast.

You’re with your family.

It’s really nice.

And then your young child, your
son, slips and falls into the water.

Now it’s a six foot drop into the
water off this like coastal walkway.

That’s already a rough fall
for a kid, but he’s in the ocean.

The ocean is going pretty hard.

A 26 year old, Filipino man, just immediately
jumps in after and he saves the kid.

So they get some nets
and stuff down so they

can help him climb up
and they help the kid

climb up first and
then the man climbs up.

He saved his kid’s life.

That’s pretty awesome.

The parents wanted his
name to say thank you.

It’s very traditional like if
someone finds your wallet or

does something for you, you
send them a thank you present.

So like if you find something and turn into
the police and then the person shows up and

they get it back, they’ll
send you a thank you.

I found a wallet turned it into the cops.

I ended up getting a cake the next
week just showed up in my house.

So this is a normal
Japanese thing to want to

say thank you in some
way, usually by sending

some, you know, it’s not cheap, but
it’s not nothing, it’s a little present.

The Filipino man said,
and this is a phrase

that he probably learned
from anime, this being

a non native Japanese
speaker, there’s already an

assumption that he’s
using this sentence because

he’s either watched
a ton of old samurai

movies or he’s really
into anime where they

say this kind of thing
translated into English.

This means I’m not important
enough for people to know my name.

So when you win the
big fight, when you save

the town, when you protect
people and they go like, who are you?

This is the phrase
you use in these sort of

old movies and in your
anime and in your manga.

I can’t say it cool,
I got to actually get

an example of an anime
character saying it so

I can copy that because
I’m sure my inflections

wrong and my spacing
of the words is wrong.

But I’ll say it one more
time, super slow so

that you can get it and
you can practice this.

No, no, no, no, no, day, why, night, okay?

So you can take that,
take some time, practice

it, coerce it to yourself,
maybe find some

examples of it on the
internet and awesome.

You can now say this
really cool thing, but

you have to do something
cool first, you can’t

just walk around
saying that, you have to

actually do something cool, this might be
the problem for most people saying doing

something cool and then
saying something cool.

Also it kind of means like study your anime
because everyone on the internet who heard

that he said this
after doing this really

cool thing was like, dude,
this is the coolest guy ever.

He’s using the lines,
he’s using the lines

properly, I, he’s representing the
humble hero, which is really cool.

I have only said two cool lines in
my life and it was totally by accident.

And so I once gave my
judo suit, both related

to judo, of course,
I once gave my judo

suit to my wife because
she was going to wash

it that night and she
said, oh my god, so

much blood and I looked at her
and said, don’t worry, it’s not mine.

That was awesome.

And again, because I didn’t intend it
to be cool, it turned out super cool.

And then once I was
doing like a meeting

with some people who
just come to Japan, and

of course judo comes up because
it’s like, what are your hobbies?

What do you do?

I do judo tatata.

Everyone goes, have you ever broken a bone?

And I looked and I said, do you
mean mine or someone else’s?

Ah, that was awesome again.

For me, it was legitimate inquiry.

Have I ever broken
one of my own bones or

have I in judo, which does have like arm
locks and stuff broken someone else’s bone?

But because again, it
was unintentionally cool.

I didn’t try to be cool.

It was actually way cooler that way.

Scandal.

No, this is the least scandalous
scandal I’ve seen in so long.

Some top Japanese skateboarders
took part in underage drinking.

I, 14, 15, 16 was a very,
very serious skateboarder.

It is basically at
that point in life, I

thought, the job I’m
going to have for the rest

of my life is going to be
professional skateboarder.

I was trying to figure out
if I could move to California.

I made a little video of myself
skateboarding that I could send to Dogtown.

No, I wasn’t that good.

Like I was, okay, wait, wait, wait, wait.

I was very, very good
for a complete amateur,

but I was nowhere
near professional quality.

And I think by the time
you’re 15, 16 in the skateboard

world, you either have it or
you don’t and I did not have it.

I was good.

I was always going to be okay, but I
was never going to be professional.

This was during an Olympic
qualification trip to China.

And in Japan, the drinking age is
20, in China, the drinking age is 18.

So if they’re all 18 or 19, in China,
it’s perfectly legal for them to drink.

So I think this is what happened.

They didn’t give everyone’s
age because they said group.

I think they were all 18, 19,
20 year olds, skateboarders.

I guess this is it, skateboarders are
going to drink if you let them drink.

They were in a different country
where it’s legal for them to drink.

They’re like, hey, let’s
go out and legally drink.

So they went out and they legally
drank and they had a good time.

And Japan has got
this weird idea of holding

people to Japanese laws and
rules even when they leave Japan.

They have said that
if you go to a place like

Canada where marijuana
is illegal and you

smoke marijuana or take a brownie
or cookie word of it, they deliver it in.

And then you come back to
Japan, you’ve committed a crime.

They say if you go
overseas and you create

unsensored pornography,
you’ve broken a law in Japan.

And so this is it.

They have this weird idea.

And I don’t actually know
how you would prosecute this.

That might be why
these guys are just getting

trouble because they are representatives
of Japan in another country.

So they’re probably partially
funded by the government.

I don’t know how well that goes because
if you’re going for an Olympic qualifier,

you probably have
taken money from the

government, which does
mean the government does

have a little say in
how you behave or sees

you sort of like an
ambassador to your country.

You have to behave
better that kind of thing.

One of the skateboarders
themselves were

reprimanded the coach was,
which I think is pretty fair.

He didn’t get fired.

He didn’t get in trouble in any real way.

They’re like, dude, you got
to control your skateboarders.

You’re probably looking at them going like
these are like 19 year old adults overseas.

They’re taking care of themselves.

I don’t know really what you want me to do.

So I think reprimanding
the coach, having

him say like you should have
kept these guys inside and stuff.

I think that’s fair.

As long as he doesn’t get into any actual
trouble because again, no law was the way

he was presented when I saw it in Japanese
news was like a crime has been committed.

Like they’ve broken the law, which they
actually very technically had not done.

And you know, technically
right is the best kind of right.

I cannot hear the voices out there.

When I was a skateboarder
and I was 14, 15

years old, did I ever
under age drink, never.

It’s actually funny.

I talked to Canadians, I’m like, how old
are you when you had your first drink?

It seems like 13, 14 is really normal.

I had one beer.

I don’t like beer.

I don’t do acquired tastes.

I had one beer when I was like 15 years
old or 14 years old and I didn’t like it.

And I was like, nope, never had beer again.

So that’s actually probably a good thing.

If I had it later, I might have liked
it and then be a beer drinker now.

And it was, we’re on
to the gubernatorial

election news and this
is actually quite a lot.

And aid to the current
Tokyo governor, Yudical

Koike, claims that
she faked her degree.

How do you become the
governor of a prefecture?

And they don’t know if you’ve
actually got a degree or not.

So now there’s this
big thing out there like

this is someone who worked for
her who claims she faked her degree.

The claim is that she did not
graduate from the University of Cairo.

Koike and response said
she’s unhappy at the allegation.

She says she will continue to list
herself as a graduate of Cairo University.

Now, I looked at that sentence.

I’ve done a lot of political
stories on the Engineers Japan.

I look very carefully
at what they’re actually

saying because that’s
the more interesting thing.

How they say it.

What they’re saying is the important part.

In this case, she has
not denied the allegation.

She said I will continue to list myself
as a graduate of the University of Cairo.

That doesn’t mean she actually got her
degree or could prove she has her degree

from the University of Cairo, which is
a very interesting, very small distinction.

Another interesting thing
she’s done lately is on x.com.

She started posting
short videos of her

explaining her policies,
but it’s not actually her.

It’s actually an AI
version of her moving her

mouth and face and then speaking her
policies within AI version of her voice.

And that is an interesting
thing because now

these videos of her
explaining things can

be generated by her staff and put on
the internet like she’s talking to you.

And a lot of people, again,
this is very mixed feelings.

AI is a big issue right now
generating a lot of mixed feelings.

Should she be doing it personally?

Is this good enough?

Is AI a threat?

And she’s saying, look, we have
these technologies at our hand.

We should use technologies
that are available to us.

I’m using this technology to
get my policies out into the world.

And then of course,
the first set of comments

under her videos are,
did you have AI generate

your degree from the
University of Cairo?

Which is awesome.

In Tokyo, it’s gotten very specific
and this is primarily about poster.

So in Japan, most of
your election knowledge,

most of my an actual
election knowledge

comes from the American system, which
is all blasting ads and news and stuff.

America dominates the news
cycle even in other countries.

So a lot of what I
understand of politics is

influenced by heavily
by the American system.

The Canadian system honestly
very similar, but way more low key.

There’s a lot of TV advertising stuff.

Japan has very strict rules.

You can’t really do the same thing.

There’s a couple of weeks
where you can get out

on top of a truck and then speak into
a microphone and shout it out that way.

You can’t just plaster
posters or ads everywhere.

There is actually a set like
big board and then you as

someone running in the race
can put your poster on that board.

It’s very weird the first time you see it
and 99% of these posters are nondescript.

It’s some very Japanese
looking businessman,

thumbs up in the camera and just
looking forward with a very awkward smile.

Sometimes they’ve got some
kind of like hook and like I used to

play soccer so he’s holding a
soccer ball, something like that.

So they’re trying to
put as much personality

as they can into a very
awkward photo shoot.

This system has been hijacked in Tokyo.

56 people have entered
and they can put up posters.

They’re mostly politicians, but 19 of
the 56 places are from the NHK party.

Now this is not the actual NHK party.

They used to be called the anti NHK party
because they hated NHK and the fact that

you had to pay fees to this
national broadcasting company.

They’ve become a party
that’s essentially trolling

politics, trying to get
messages out there

that are not big issues or overly popular,
but they’re still actually a lot of ways

kind of important because
there are things people

are either embarrassed
or too shy to talk about.

So the first one that I really
enjoyed was a female kick boxer.

She took up half the slots.

So if you have like 60 spaces for posters,
30 of those were the same posters she paid

for, and it’s just her
saying like, I’m a kick

boxer, not even like I
want to be governor.

I’m a kick boxer and I’m a
really good kick boxer and

you should follow me on
Instagram and watch me kickbox.

Another candidate
got a warning from the

police for making a
poster that is of an almost

nude woman posing in what
they called a very sexy pose.

Their platform is talking
about censorship in Japan.

This is the same group.

I did this story
previously, but I can’t

remember how long ago,
where they talked about

how if Japan would open
up its censorship laws

and not use pixelization
in their pornography

that Japan could make a lot more
money with the pornography that they have.

We have done stories
where it’s like the

ranking of pornography
has come out from Pornhub

and it’s always like Japan or
Japanese is really high in the ranking.

So this guy is saying
we should capitalize on

this love for this thing
our country does make

and we are holding it back
by being too conservative.

He’s teamed up with
actress Sakurai Miyu, a

very specific kind of
actress if we’re going

to be clear and they
wanted to end nudity

censorship laws and
promote freedom of expression.

Because she was basically
naked, I think they had

little flowers over the bits
that need to be censored.

The police came and said you
have to take the posters down.

So then this guy who had decided like I’m
going to promote this porn star and put up

these posters and make my issue censorship,
he’s like I’m going to pivot since I’m not

allowed to put those
posters up, I’m going

to pivot to making
cannabis legal in Shibuya.

So marijuana cannabis is illegal in Japan.

It’s actually still very seriously.

They don’t they don’t like
classified drugs in order.

It’s just drugs bad.

So heroin and marijuana are in the
same group as far as drugs are concerned.

So if you smuggle in heroin and you smuggle
in marijuana, same punishment across the

board, which a lot
of people are like ah,

that you know other
countries they like grade

it like marijuana is
not as bad as heroin in

Japan that’s considered
like a slippery slope.

So they’re just like no
drugs bad if it’s a bad drug.

You did a bad thing.

You get the exact same sentence.

So he’s pivoted his platform to try to make
posters he also puts on face paint like the

Joker and stuff that actually in
itself makes me take it less seriously.

If you wanted to do
this seriously he should

just wear a suit and
look as normal as possible

and they start very seriously talking about
censorship laws and don’t even get like

salacious on the posters
and I bet you’d get

a lot of support because
one of the hardest

things to do is it
takes something that is

essentially embarrassing
like I look at pornography

and I want to de-sensor pornography
again he’s thinking of the economy.

I’m actually kind of on
board with this as a concept.

If there is an economic
gain for the country

by doing this thing it
might be worth doing.

Sure regulate the industry.

I actually have no problem with that.

I think safety is very important but because
he like dresses up and puts on a face

paint and tries to look
at the Joker and stuff

it immediately goes well
why would I take you seriously.

So he’s actually undermining his own
potential of actually getting one of these you

might be considered a
side issue into the forefront.

Of course there’s commentary.

The news did interviews
with people on the

street and one man says
it does not communicate

their policies at all
and I was like well no

it does because the
kick box or her policy

is I really like kickboxing and kickboxing
is cool and you should follow me online.

It’s a pretty clear policy it doesn’t apply
to Japan in any real way unless you want

to make kickboxing
like a national thing

that everyone has to
do which would be crazy.

And then the censorship one
with the almost naked lady on it.

I mean the policy is pretty clear
we would like to stop censoring this.

There were a lot of
complaints that they were

putting up like basically a naked lady on
a poster where kids go by which again I’m

actually on board with
that which is another

reason to do it in a
more serious vein where

people actually might take a moment and
actually listen to what you’re talking about.

And the policy is I like
kickboxing and I like sexy ladies.

Thank you.

you you.

you.

you you you you you

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[BLANK_AUDIO]

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She’ll be drinking in public
has gotten away and I’ll have.

Does mean the
government does mean the

government does mean
the government does have it.

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