HOLY CRAP A team of Japanese researchers has used an MRI to “successfully decode dreams by measuring brain activity during sleep.” It’s the first time scientists anywhere have been able to “read dreams.” A cinema in Nagoya is planning to go “4-D” by allowing moviegoers to “experience wind, sprays of water, scents, light, fog and [...]

TAKE COVER! The government says if a major quake were to strike the Nankai Trough, it would cause ¥17 trillion in damage—more than 10 times the cost of the 3/11 disasters. Officials at the defense ministry are in hot water for free-speech violations after asking applicants to provide info about their spouses’ nationality and whether [...]

STRANGE BUT TRUE A Japanese man who traveled to Malaysia to marry a woman he met over the internet was rescued by police after being kidnapped by three Nigerians at the airport. Officials in Hyogo suspended a prefectural employee for three months for “stuffing his backpack full of food at an all-you-can-eat buffet and trying [...]

MILESTONES A blind Japanese acupuncturist who lives in San Diego is attempting to become the first sightless man to sail across the Pacific Ocean. A research team led by scientists at the University of Tokyo say they may have found “a clue for developing drugs to kill multidrug-resistant bacteria.” Researchers at the National Cancer Center [...]

NICE WORK, FELLAS A high school baseball coach in Chiba was suspended for breaking one of his players’ arms after the kid missed a fly ball in practice. It was later revealed that the same coach had “hit another first-year in the face with a bat, knocking out his front teeth and splitting his lip.” [...]

POLICE BLOTTER Cops in Toshima-ku arrested four operators of a brothel called the Otsuka Cosplay Academy for employing a 14-year-old girl as a sex worker. Authorities in Hachioji believe that a serial arsonist is setting fire to local vending machines in an effort to “steal change.” A 35-year-old lieutenant commander in the Maritime Self-Defense Force was [...]

HUH? Osaka’s last remaining streetcar company introduced a tram line whose color scheme is meant to evoke “traditional Japanese aesthetic philosophy.” Lawmakers have enacted measures to combat a fraud scheme known as oshigai, which involves bullying unsuspecting people into selling “precious metal jewelry and other items for unreasonably low prices.” Police in Fukuoka say an [...]

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK According to financial disclosure statements, deputy prime minister Taro Aso is the proud owner of houses in Shibuya and Karuizawa; 360,398 shares of stock in 16 companies; and eight golf club memberships. The government’s Council for Ainu Policy Promotion says it hopes to conduct Japan’s first-ever census of indigenous peoples. [...]

HERE WE GO AGAIN Just five months after its inception, the Nuclear Regulation Authority has already fired a senior official for having an “inappropriate exchange” with the operator of a nuclear power plant. Meanwhile, a high-ranking official at the land ministry (the parliamentary secretary for reconstruction, if you must know) mysteriously resigned, allegedly over “a [...]

LOST AND FOUND Six months after the environment ministry declared the Japanese river otter extinct, officials in Ehime are planning “a full-fledged search” for the creature in response to reports of recent sightings. JR Central began operation of the new N700A shinkansen—the first bullet train that can run on autopilot. A group of Japanese and [...]

OUCH! A Fukuoka man in his 30s was hospitalized after being bitten by a redback spider while removing a can of coffee from a vending machine. A special-ed teacher in Aichi was reprimanded for handcuffing a ten-year-old autistic student who wouldn’t follow her instructions. A worker at a nursing home in western Tokyo is in [...]

THIS JUST IN… The NPA says 33 people around the country were arrested for voting improprieties in December’s general election—the lowest figure since current election laws were enacted in 1950. An online survey by research group Macromill found that 75 percent of 20-year-olds “expect little from the country’s politics.” In a breakthrough that could help [...]

ONLY IN JAPAN In an annual ritual meant to “foster spiritual strength,” 100 SDF troops in Hokkaido engaged in a tug of war with a tank. Zookeepers in Fukuoka have discovered that feeding chimpanzees three leeks a day helps them ward off colds. A 114-year-old Osaka resident took the title of world’s oldest woman after [...]

THAT’LL SHOW ’EM The National Police Agency and the Japan Securities Dealers Association announced new measures intended to keep yakuza groups from… stock trading. Leading online game operator Gree blamed a software glitch for overcharging the accounts of 733 minors—including 30 kids who were stuck with bills of more than ¥100,000 each. Education officials in [...]

Chinese Colonel Explains His Hatred of Japan With Weird Animal Metaphor Chinese Senior Colonel Liu Mingfu must have just finished watching a nature documentary as he answered questions about China’s territorial disputes, attempting to convey his hatred of Japan through strange animal metaphors. ‘‘America is the global tiger and Japan is Asia’s wolf and both are [...]