Tuesday June 23
 
10:36
 
The ‘IC You’ Card

I hate having to carry around an “Alien Registration Card” which includes my full address – on top of burglary risk I have the continual daily risk that should my keys and wallet be lost together, thieves have a direct path to my home. Paranoid? My apartment had already been burgled once in Japan – I don’t want to make it any easier.

Now we have the new gaijin card. Yeah!

That’s still not the worst of it. I mentioned that embedded computer chip. The ZRK is a “smart card.” Most places worldwide issue smart cards for innocuous things like transportation and direct debit, and you have to swipe the card on a terminal to activate it. Carrying one is, at least, optional.

Not in Japan. Although the 2005 proposal suggested foreign “swiping stations” in public buildings, the technology already exists to read IC cards remotely. With Japan’s love of cutting-edge gadgets, data processing will probably not stop at the swipe. The authorities will be able to remotely scan crowds for foreigners.

In other words, the IC chip is a transponder — a bug.

Now imagine these scenarios: Not only can police scan and detect illegal aliens, but they can also uncover aliens of any stripe. It also means that anyone with access to IC chip scanners (they’re going cheap online) could possibly swipe your information. Happy to have your biometric information in the hands of thieves?

Moreover, this system will further encourage racial profiling. If police see somebody who looks alien yet doesn’t show up on their scanner (such as your naturalized author, or Japan’s thousands of international children), they will more likely target you for questioning — as in: “Hey, you! Stop! Why aren’t you detectable?”

No!

What does “not deemed to be acting like spouses” mean anyway?

And what’s Juki Net? Is it like Mixi for music? Are all gaijins going to be “required” to join Juki-boxu-net and download Japanese J-shit-pop every week?

At least laws here are written down, unlike Korea. Don’t get me started on Korean immigration.

Wednesday November 12
 
17:52
 
Firestarter

불닭, or Buldalk, is one of the spiciest Korean foods there is. Bul coming for the Chinese character for “fire” and dalk meaning “chicken”, this is a dish in Korea that is so spicy that most Koreans have tried it once, but very few make a habit of it.

Would the restaurant Buldalk in Shibuya, then, live up to its name? Or would is be another spiced-down-for-Japanese tastes experience?

Initial signs were not good – no Korean menu and a Japanese only pen-scanner based ordering system (!) means there’s likely to be few real Koreans going there, unless they’ve lived in Japan for a while. Delving into the menu, I found that to get spicy Buldalk you have to pay extra. What?! So the standard “Fire Chicken” isn’t spicy? You’d expect a restaurant to be able to cook properly the food it named itself after!

We ordered the spicy one. It wasn’t even close to what you’d expect in Korea. Yeah, my Japanese friends were shouting “my mouth hurts, my mouth hurts” and trying to use makoli (막고리) to soothe the pain – but Japanese can’t handle anything spicy. They put one DROP of tabasco sauce on a pizza, for chrissakes.

That said, it shows just how long it has been since I had real Korean food in Korea that I revelled in last night’s offerings. I haven’t had totorimuk (도토리묵) for ages – in fact it’s the first time to find it in Japan.. that alone pleased me! And even though it only had six slivers of totori, the dressing was like heaven. I gobbled it down trying not to think “I paid 1000 yen for this when I’d get five times the amount for free as ’service’ in a Korean bar in Korea.”

The delights of the night in pictures:

불닭 – Buldalk

도토리묵 – Totorimuk

불고기 – Bulgogi

막고리(동동주) – Makkoli (Dongdongju), a Korean alcohol

소주! – Soju!

None of the Japanese “on the rocks” or “with soda” business!

Monday October 27
 
17:00
 
Why The Yen Is Strong

From the BBC:

Earlier on Monday the Group of Seven (G7) industrialised nations issued a statement warning that the strength of the yen was a threat to economic stability, which was taken as a threat of co-ordinated action to reduce the value of the currency.

While the yen briefly weakened, it soon climbed back towards Friday’s 13-year high against the dollar.

The yen has been strengthening as a result of the end of the carry trade, in which traders borrowed the Japanese currency and used it to buy currencies with higher interest rates.

As the difference between Japanese rates and those elsewhere in the world has fallen, traders have been unwinding the carry trade, which means they have been using other currencies to buy yen, which has boosted the Japanese currency.

This makes sense. Interest rates in Japan are almost 0%. I always send my money back to the UK to take advantage of better interest rates. The difference between me and Japanese, however, is that I am in no hurry to transfer it back since money in the UK is useful to me. The Japanese seem to be transferring it back even though the rate is terrible.

One of the few exchanges rising was the Seoul market, which reversed early losses to close up 0.8% after South Korea’s central bank cut its key interest rate from 5% to 4.25% at a rare, unscheduled meeting.

There are some real amazing bargains to be had at the moment with the difference between the Yen and GBP, Korean Won. A Nikon D700, for example, at 40%+ cheaper in Korea than Japan – it is usually 40% more expensive.

Wednesday October 8
 
10:20
 
I Must Not Visit Korea

The exchange rate shift has caused some excellent opportunities:

Black MacBook in Japan: 179,000 Yen.

Black MacBook in Korea: 1,589,000 Won.
Yen equivalent price: 119,212 Yen.

Ok, so that’s based on mid-rate which is not achievable – but still, that’s the top of the range MacBook for the equivalent price of the bottom of the range MacBook. It would be very tempting if the machines were not getting replaced soon.

D700 in Japan: 324,300 Yen – 10% (cashback in points): 292,000 Yen.

D700 in Korea: 3,390,000 Won.
Yen equivalent price: 253,174 Yen.

Again that’s mid-rate which is not achievable – however, I’ve seen 3,125,000 Won on Korean auction sites which means that an inshop price in the camera area near Myoeng-dong or in Yong-san would be cheaper. That price would be very tempting if there was an international warranty. It might be possible to get a Grey-market import though – those are often imported from Japan and would have a Japanese warranty. It would need to have been imported before the rates changed, however.

Tuesday July 29
 
00:12
 
Up-Skirt

From Times Online:

Here is one from the creep-ware department. Japanese tech reporter Nobuyuki Hayashi reports that Apple is equipping the new iPhone 3G models for the Japan market with a country-specific feature to stop local perverts from snapping so-called “up-skirt” or “down-blouse” photos of unsuspecting women.

Evidently, this form of “gotcha!” amateur photography is becoming an increasing problem in some public places in Japan, like on the escalators of Tokyo subway stops, Cult of Mac reports. As a result, camera phone manufacturers have been selling handsets that make a distinctive shutter sound to warn women (or, anyone nearby for that matter) that someone is taking a photo with their mobile. The first generation iPhones, however, had a silence mode that disabled this warning function. The new models, now on sale in Japan, however, “do make a sound if you take picture even when it is set to silent mode,” Hayashi writes.

In the UK and USA no sound is required because the iPhone doesn’t have a wide angle lens – the arses are just TOO GOD DAMN FAT to be captured with an iPhone.

But this is not new. In Korea and Japan all cell phones need to make a noise when taking photos. It has not been possible to up-skirt or down-blouse in Japan or Korea for a long time… not that you need to in Japan, the skirts are so damn short that no “upping” is required.

The iPhone is not available in Korea, so that is probably why it is country specific to Japan – the only country where the arses are small and sexy enough for people to WANT to photograph them secretly.

By the way, “hayashi” is “chopsticks” in Japan – so this man is called Mr Chopsticks. Lovely.