A pair of online game players in Shanghai got a bit carried away, resulting in one of them being carried away on a slab.

Qiu Chengwei, 41, stabbed competitor Zhu Caoyuan repeatedly in the chest after he was told Zhu had sold his “dragon sabre”, used in the popular online game, “Legend of Mir 3″, [the China Daily] said a Shanghai court was told on Tuesday.

“Legend of Mir 3″ features heroes and villains, sorcerers and warriors, many of whom wield enormous swords.

After Qiu and a friend jointly won a weapon, they lent it to Zhu who turned around and sold it 7,200 yuan (464 pounds). Qui went to the police, but they told him that theft of a virtual item was not protected under the law.

Despite Zhu’s promises to turn over the money to the pair, Qui became enraged and stabbed Zhu with a non-cyber type knife in the chest, killing him.

Woman’s shirt, found in a department store.

Now that impossible-to-attain deadlines are approaching and people are talking about putting a further burden on cash-strapped state coffers to pay for so-called ” emissions reduction credits,” even Japan is starting to have second thoughts about how to implement the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. The government keeps coming up with various plans, but they are rightfully shying away from imposing a “carbon tax” on an economy for which flat-lining is considered to be a positive development.

Though Japan is obliged to curb its greenhouse gas emissions by 6% from the 1990 level by 2012 under Kyoto, emissions in fiscal 2002 were 7.6% higher than in 1990. Japan’s Environment Ministry originally said that a carbon tax is required in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but the government’s final plan merely called for discussion of a tax “in a serious and comprehensive manner.”

However, Environment Minister Yuriko Koike (who, apparently, is qualified for her job based on a BA in Sociology from Cairo University and a stint as an economic newsreader babe on a Tokyo TV station) says she still believes that taxing people into submission is an effective way to fight global warming. “We want to continue our discussions and aim to introduce the levy in fiscal 2006,” she said.

As the old joke goes, I thought what I saw was the light at the end of the tunnel when suddenly I realized it was a train coming at me.

Though the government is stridently denying it, it appears as if the current Japanese economic “recovery” could possibly end up going the way of previous up turns – nowhere at all.

Industrial production fell in February from the previous month, while unemployment rose. The strength of the yen is making it difficult for Japan to export itself out of recession. All the while, the government is trying to urge everyone to take solace in the fact that the economy is merely flat-lining instead of heading downwards.

Other signs of possible trouble on the horizon include a sharp drop in household spending and retail sales, along with rising unemployment. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 Stock Average is tanking as foreign investors are pulling out of Japanese stocks in fear of the country’s economic future.

As always the government is clueless. They are using the media to create the perception the recession that has endured for more than 10 years is over, and so now it is time to — raise taxes, of course!

Just today, the Japanese Diet voted to phase out a 20% income tax cut that was adopted in 1999 for the purpose of stimulating the economy. By eliminating the cut, taxes effectively will be raised by 10% from their current levels in 2006 and then another 10% the following year.

The government claims the money is needed to curb public debt used to pay for things like roads that go nowhere, lining every last inch of the nation’s riverbeds with concrete, massive slush funds maintained by police and other public officials, and exorbitant salaries paid to do-nothing paper pushers and bureaucrat pooh-bahs. Apparently, the notion of cutting costs never has entered the Nagatacho mind.

Of course, this will not be the first time that Japanese politicians, when faced with a budding economic recovery, have acted like ivory hunters setting upon the last living pachyderm on the face of the earth. As Bloomberg columnist William Pesek Jr. writes:

It doesn’t take much to recall episodes where Japan created fresh economic headwinds. In 2001, for example, it tightened fiscal policy, worsening a decline. In 2000, the Bank of Japan raised interest rates amid modest growth. And in the late 1990s, politicians raised taxes, scuttling a pick up in demand.

Oh, and by the way. . .

The 20% income tax increase is a totally separate issue from the government’s other plan to raise the consumption (sales) tax from the current 5% to 15% or even 20%.

Eleven Tokyo railway companies will introduce women-only rush hour carriages starting sometime in April or May.

Boys up to elementary school age and physically handicapped men will also be able to ride in the special carriages, so I guess they are not really women-only after all. . .

More of the Rakuten Eagles bra model!

Click here for more Triumph International theme underwear.

Jessica Mitford’s The American Way of Death was an unlikely best seller in 1963 that exposed the funeral industry’s exploitation of families at their most vulnerable in search of higher profits. Mitford released a revised edition the book called The American Way of Death Revisited before her own passing in 1996.

Though funerals are conducted in an entirely different way in Japan, the profit motive is universal, so the practices Mitford exposed in the United States also plague Japan. Complaints about these practices have spurred Japan’s Fair Trade Commission to launch a probe of the funeral industry. While the source of the problem is the same as that pointed out by Mitford—an industry that tries to get it while it can during a family’s period of vulnerability—this is exacerbated in Japan today. Society’s aging is causing the market to expand, resulting in intensified competition among the companies that provide funeral services and related products.

A questionnaire survey conducted in 2003 by the Japan Consumer’s Association found that the average cost of a funeral nationwide was 1.5 million yen, or about US$ 14,000. This does not count the 380,000 yen (US$ 3,500) for expenses associated with the wake, or the 480,000 yen (US$ 4,400) yen paid to the Buddhist priest for various services. Thus, the total cost of a funeral for a family is roughly the same as a new automobile purchase.

Some specific practices the Commission cited include extra charges levied by funeral directors for services despite prearranged contracts when the number of mourners exceeds expectations, or the failure to return funds to people who cancel prepaid accounts to cover their own funeral expenses. The Commission examined whether estimates were presented in advance and whether the funeral directors demanded unreasonable discounts from other businesses, such as florists and hearse operators. Their report is expected this June.

As I noted, Buddhist funeral services in Japan are very different from their Western counterparts. The accompanying photo shows mourners performing one of their obligations, which is lighting and offering a stick of incense to the deceased. If you’re interested in a detailed explanation of Japanese funeral services, try this website.

Perhaps the most dramatic difference between a Japanese service and those in the West comes at the end of the funeral itself. Most Japanese are cremated, and the immediate family accompanies the deceased to the crematorium. They witness the insertion of the coffin into the furnace and stay until the process is finished. When the cremation is complete, the family gathers over the ashes to place some of the remains in an urn. One member selects a bone using a large set of chopsticks and passes it directly to another family member, who also uses chopsticks to place it in the urn. While this might seem unthinkable in the West, one Japanese man told me that it brings a sense of closure, and most families feel it is an essential part of the service.

This custom, incidentally, is the reason it is considered bad form to pass food at the dinner table from one person’s chopsticks to another.

Jessica Mitford published an expose of the American funeral business, but Evelyn Waugh satirized it in his novel The Loved One, which was turned into a film starring Jonathan Winters. For an equally irreverent view of contemporary Japanese funerals, the best source is the film Soshiki (The Funeral), Itami Juzo’s directorial debut. It is billed as a comedy, but that does the movie a disservice. The Funeral is available on DVD with subtitles from Amazon.com

1.19 million beef bowl fans in Japan have signed a petition demanding that the country lift a 15-month-old ban on the import of U.S. beef that has caused Japan’s biggest beef bowl chain to drop the popular item from its menu. The petition was submitted to Agriculture Minister Yoshinobu Shimamura.

Shimamura told the petitioners, “We will try to live up to your expectations,” which is Japanese for, “You people must be nuts! We’ve got a domestic beef industry to protect!”

But not everyone agrees with the beef bowlers.

Surveys have shown that from 65 to 70 percent of Japanese consumers don’t want U.S. beef, believing it is dangerous. That’s ironic . . . given that Japan has had 15 cases of BSE since September 2001. (As a result, the United States has banned Japanese beef since then.)

Some U.S. lawmakers have called for trade sanctions if Japan does not re-open its market soon.

Click here for a collection of 1920s and 1930s Japanese travel brochures from the collection of David Levine.

This online gallery contains images of original brochures, not reproductions.

That is the slogan of the uchimizu website maintained by the Japan Water Forum.

Uchimizu is the Japanese practice of watering your garden and foyer, and the entire street in front of your dwelling or shop, especially in the summertime. In addition to reducing dust in the air, this practice is believed to cool the air.

The uchimizu page provides the following “ABC’s of Uchimizu.”

1. Prepare a container for the water.
2. Transfer rainwater, leftover bath water, air-conditioner drainage or other collected water (never tap water) into the container.
3. Splash the water around.

Though this is pretty straightforward, it simply would not be a Japanese procedure without a long list of precautions designed protect the writer against responsibility in case of just about any silly contingency imaginable. Here they are.

• Wear a hat or a cap if available to protect you from the sun.
• Be aware of passers-by and other participants.
• Refrain yourself from watering on busy streets.
• Sprinkle water in a quiet and safe place.
• DO NOT WATER at curves, crossroads, or over manhole covers. It makes the street highly slippery.
• Car drivers and bike riders: Please be careful when entering watered areas.

That’s an awful lot of information just to splash a little water around.