Otaku // Current

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Mass: We Pray - The Video Game

A family shouldn’t have to wait until Sunday to worship the Lord. Now you can go to church every day without leaving your... more

remanns
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Japan loves Obama so much they gave him his own verb

Obamu: v. To proceed optimistically despite challenging obstacles. Really, Japan? According to CNNGo Tokyo, the... more

Nettle
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Plug-in electric scooter put to the test

“Mezamashi TV” morning show takes a new plug-in scooter for a 141-kilometer test run from Numazu to Tokyo. The scooter... more

Nettle
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Joe Madureira Talks Darksiders Design

Joe Mad, former comic book wunderkind illustrator and eternal procrastinator, talks about the backstory and design of his video... more

ShadowPraxis
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Japanese Mac vs PC Apple Ad

Teasing how MS freezes and restarts with no warning. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-3MtYn9W5w&NR=1

Nettle
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It's illegal to be fat in Japan

Thanks to an anti-obesity law passed last year, Japanese salarymen across the nation are pulling up their shirts to have their... more

slagface
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Obama Arrives in Tokyo to Mend Fences

TOKYO — President Obama, seeking to mend fences with America’s most important Asian ally, announced that he would establish a high-level working group on the contentious issue of the continuing presence of a Marine base in Okinawa.

The decision, announced at a news conference just a few hours after he touched down in Tokyo to begin his first presidential trip to Asia,appears to represent a concession by the Obama administration to at least consider Japan’s concerns. It comes less than a month after Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates seemed to shut the door on renegotiating a deal reached in 2006 to relocate the United States Marine airbase in Futenma to a less populated part of the island.

Mr. Obama’s visit comes at a time when the two allies are grappling with recent shifts in their overall relationship, and Japan’s newly elected prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, searches for a more “equal partnership.” On Friday, both leaders emphasized the importance of the relationship, and stressed that the two sides were seeing eye-to-eye. Standing beside Mr. Obama at the Japanese equivalent of the White House, the Kantei, Mr. Hatoyama said, “We’ve come to call each other Barack and Yukio, and gotten quite accustomed to calling each other by our names.

But White House officials said that the United States has only agreed to talks “on the implementation” of the Okinawa agreement, and said that they don’t expect to the larger shape of the agreement, which also calls for relocating some 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam. Japan policy experts indicated that the establishment of the working group is likely only a face-saving way for Mr. Hatoyama to tell the Japanese public that he is keeping his campaign promise...

The United States also appeared to give ground on the other contentious security alliance issue, accepting Mr. Hatoyama’s pledge of $5 billion in aid to Afghanistan, which Mr. Hatoyama linked to his government’s decision to end the Japanese Navy’s refueling mission near Afghanistan. Mr. Obama said the promise “underscores Japan ’s prominent role” in the broad international effort in Afghanistan .

Still, there have been ample signs that the half-century alliance may be entering a new phase. In the past, squabbles between the United States and Japan have focused mostly on trade disputes over luxury cars and semiconductors, while the security alliance between the two was more stable.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/14/world/asia/14prexy.html?_r=1&hp

end of excerptTOKYO — President Obama, seeking to mend fences with America’s most important Asian ally, announced that he would... more