Gorgeous George

Ocean 13 is coming to Tokyo, and so is its major star, George Clooney, pictured here at a press conference. Watch the trailer HERE.

The Japanese Election Results

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of the current prime minister Abe Shinzo suffered a major setback in the Upper House from Sunday's (yesterday's) election, which took away the majority from their hands and delivered it into the opposition, the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), led by Ozawa Ichiro, a coalition of moderates, former socialists and conservatives. In the past, the DPJ (founded in 1996) could not muster the votes to overcome the ever powerful LDP, whose strongholds of power extended beyond big cities and into rural areas. This time around, the disenchanted voters gave their voice to the opposition after a major government bungling of national pension records and a series of scandals and corruptions.

Unlike past prime ministers who had resigned in the face of such loss, Abe defiantly decided to stay the course as prime minister. Japanese law spelled out the Lower House of the Parliament as the one choosing the prime minister. The LDP has the majority in the Lower House, which is considered to be stronger and more influential than the Upper House. Inheriting the parliamentary majorities from his most popular predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, Abe passed through legislations laws that concerned patriotism in schools and the plan to elevate Japanese military and to revise the pacifist Constitution. The recent loss will surely hold his future plans in check as the majority Upper House will be able to deny him the easy route.

Abe's recent campaign with trademark soundbytes of making Japan into a "beautiful country" has been mocked by some opposition and even his own fellow LDP politicans. He has been viewed as out of touch with the rest of the country, forgetting about the bread and butter issues, the basic needs of the people. His main theme put the emphasis on revising the pacifist Constitution, but with recent tides against him, he appeared to want to appease the mass by switching it to the economy, which came too little too late. The opposition, meanwhile, had made economy the main issue in the first place, and voters obviously rewarded DPJ's effort and handed them the Upper House.


(Photo credit: Sasaki Ko for the New York Times.)

In Memoriam: Tammy Faye (Bakker) Messner

We take a break from Tokyo to pay tribute to the woman with the most memorable mascara-run in the world, the former wife and partner of once founder PTL (Praise the Lord / People That Love) Church, Jim Bakker. Tammy Faye Messner (she was currently married to Roe Messner) died today, at 65 years of age, weighing only 65 lbs. The colon cancer that she got had spread to the lungs. The progressive disease has made it difficult for her to swallow food, hence the dramatic weight loss.

According to CNN, Tammy Faye Messner has also been known as one of the few evangelical Christians who had the support of the gay community. She was one of the first televangelists to reach out to those with AIDS when it was a little-known and much-feared disease. In return, she told King in July, "When I went -- when we lost everything, it was the gay people that came to my rescue, and I will always love them for that."

The documentary on her life, "The Eyes of Tammy Faye" is available for viewing at Hulu.com
http://www.hulu.com/watch/232459/the-eyes-of-tammy-faye

Click HERE for more information on Tammy Faye's life.

Candle Night Summer Solstice 2007

Japan is doing its part in the effort to save energy as Friday night witnessed the Candle Night Summer Solstice 2007. The event was launched in 2003 to foster an understanding of global environment and to encourage participation in the effort to cap the energy spending. The country who is host to the Kyoto Protocol is itself trailing behind its commitment to reduce the greenhouse gas emission.

The Mainichi Shimbun reported that ". . . about 20,000 light-emitting diodes on the outer walks of the Omotesando Hills building in Tokyo's Shibuya-ku were turned off at 8 p.m. on Friday, and replaced with some 500 candles in plastic tubes. Subdued lights from the candles lit up Omotesando street through the windows. . . . This year, the owners of over 60,000 buildings usually lit up at night are expected to participate in the annual event, and organizers are urging households to participate. About 630 related events are expected to be held by Sunday."

Simply Sushi

Jay McInerney from the New York Times has reviewed two recently published books on sushi. You can find the review of the article here. The two books are: Trevor Corson's "The Zen of Fish: The Story of Sushi, from Samurai to Supermarket" and Sasha Issenberg's "The Sushi Economy: Globalization and the Making of a Modern Delicacy."

Recently, the power-that-be in the sushidom of Japan started wanting to police the existence of the internationally-known delicacy. They felt the need to maintain a certain standard of the practice by issuing certificates or stamps of approvals to vendors around the world. They found it disturbing that sushi had been bastardized by the existence of such invention of the California rolls and the spicy this-and-that rolls (yeah, and you may not want to ask real sushi chefs in the most revered sushi bars and restaurants in Tokyo about such rolls either unless you are ready to be met with swords flying from their eyes).

What I did not know was that California roll, for instance, was born out of necessity (and necessity, as you know, is the mother of invention). In the mid-60s, a Los Angeles Japanese restaurant Tokyo Kaikan's sushi chef Mashita Ichiro used avocado as a substitute for fresh fatty tuna belly (toro) because such item was hard (or none) to come by; and thus was born the California roll. In the words of Edie Beale, "I don't know whether you know that; I mean, dya know that?"

Find the article here.

(Original illustration for the New York Times by Nick Dewar)