Four interesting stories in the Japanese news

I've read some interesting Japanese stories this week, so I thought I'd share them with you (don't worry, they're in English). You may have seen them, I often don't know what makes it into international news.


Firstly, a man on the police's most wanted list gave himself up on New Year's Eve, only minutes before the new year. The funny thing about the story is that he tried several times to do it, one policeman he went to refused to believe his story and sent him to another police box (yes, that is what they are called, and rightly so, they are tiny, local police stations) down the road. He was a part of that cult that gas bombed Tokyo's subway nearly 17 years ago. A very serious offence, but who would guess that he would give himself up? Here's the story. His reason for giving himself up was that the March 11 disaster: “Many senseless scenes from the massive earthquake in the Tohoku region made me question my own situation. I wanted to turn myself in by the end of 2011."


A second story is about a tuna fish. The story is here. A 269kg tuna fish caught in Japan's waters sold for the record price of US$736,700. Making it the world's most expensive tuna. The story is particularly noteworthy, because a sushi chain in Japan bought it, in the previous couple of years it has gone overseas. I don't fully understand the "it" in this, but nevertheless, the owner of the restaurant chain said, “Rather than having it taken away overseas, I wish for Japanese people to eat good tuna together. Despite the March 11 earthquake and the sluggish economy I want to lift up Japan’s spirits urging people to work hard together.”


Third story: no free flights to Japan. It was a story in October that Japan's tourist agency floated an idea that they would offer 10,000 free flights to boost flagging tourist interest in the  country. Unfortunately that wasn't approved in the budget. Full story here.


The fourth story also involved money and reveals a Japanese tradition that you might not know about. A bit like Black Friday sales (day after Thanksgiving in the US) and Boxing Day sales in Australia, they have New Year shopping here. But the big thing are bags. Like lucky-dip bags crossed with show bags. You don't know exactly what is in them, but they are supposed to be a great bargain. Here is a story that opened my eyes as to how extravagant these "bags" can be. Here are the last two paragraphs of that story:

At Seibu Ikebukuro department store in Tokyo's Toshima Ward, about 20,000 shoppers formed a line. Among the top selling lucky bags at the store was one with candy and other items, which sold for 1,000 to 3,000 yen.

Hankyu Men's Tokyo in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward, a menswear store, offered a Mercedes-Benz sports car lucky bag, along with the privilege to drive the car on a racetrack, for 24.9 million yen. About 10 people applied for the special lucky bag, which was available to just one person.

20,000 people in a line! Us, being the great shoppers that we are NOT, have never tried out this particularly Japanese tradition. It could be a long time before we do.