Daily Archives: April 1, 2011

Sakura Report #4

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This morning just a few more flowers could be seen. Most trees along Meguro river looked like in the picture to the left below. However, when I was returning home in the evening there were many that were looking like in the picture to theright below. And some trees had started to get clusters of flowers 🙂



There will probably be quite a few hanami-parties along the river this weekend. This was confirmed once I got closer to home as people had started to reserv spaces with tape and name tags. And there was a group of foreign people having a party in the dark (no lights as we usually have due to the rolling blackout). I think they might have been from the Polish embassy that is within spitting distance from where we live, not that you necessarily want to spit at the Polish embassy 😉

Finally, anyone planning to come to Tokyo for sakura 2011? A good bet is that it will peak mid to late next week so you better start booking flights 🙂

Worse than Earthquakes and Nuclear Crisis?

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As if earthquakes, tsunamis and nuclear crisis should not be enough there is yet another crisis to be added. The sumo crisis, which may be almost on an equal level of crisis for some people.

It actually started a few months back when it was discovered that a few sumo wrestlers had been part of fixing some matches; of course this is part of a scheme organized by one or more of the organized crime gangs in Japan. Today came the verdict. 19 wrestlers forced to retire, 6 from the highest makuuchi division, 8 from the second highest juryo division, and the rest from the lower divisions (see wikipedia for details on sumo). 17 coaches demoted because of their wrestlers involvement.

Unfortunately I don’t think this is an April’s Fools Day joke 🙁

Yogurt On the Verge of being Extinct

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This is not an April’s fools joke… I hope, since I heard the news yesterday. Or rather, I hope it is a joke because I eat yogurt almost every weekday morning.

Anyway, we have run into a shortage of yogurt and other groceries that require a lot of energy to produce. Natto (fermented beans) for instance is another item that is difficult to find, but it is not as important as yogurt ;-).