17 posts tagged “japan”
Some nice news in the world of civic engineering – researchers in Hokkaido, Japan have patented “musical roads”. A series of grooves are cut into the road surface. Depending on how far apart they are, they form different tones. So far there is a pop song carved into at least one road. Playback only works at 28mph and can be difficult to “hear” just right.
I’ve never liked the rib-juddering rumble strips before toll booths that are trying to slow you down on the approach, but I never imagined they could be adjusted to make music.
These artists created wonderfully organic-looking pieces out of the least organic materials possible.
PingMag has an interview in English with the art duo ParaModel (Yasuhiko Hayashi and Yusuke Nagano) and more pics of other their art installations.
The company hopes to mass produce them to sell for under $8,500 within 5 years. Which is actually not a bad price considering it complains alot less than a twelve year old with a shovel.
According to the study Japanese people tend to look at people's eyes to interpret someone's emotional state. If you look at typical Japanese anime you will see large, expressive eyes and small mouths. Japanese right-side-up emoticons tend to keep the "mouth" neutral, but change the symbols for the "eyes". Thus you get happy ^_^ and surprised O_O
Americans tend to look at people's mouths for emotional cues. If you look at our cartoons compared to Japanese anime, eyes are proportionally smaller and not as expressive, while mouths are larger and more expressive. Homer Simpson is a great example. Although he has big eyes and a big mouth, his mouth does all the emoting; his eyes almost never change. Therefore, American sideways emoticons are happy :-) or sad :-( or funny :-P
The researchers think this is a deeply rooted cultural difference. Japanese culture puts a high premium on restraining one's display of feelings, so one's eyes will be more revealing than the rest of the face. Americans value directness, so big toothy grins are all right.
(note: anime in Japanese refers to all animation. So Mickey Mouse, Asterix, and the Simpsons are considered anime too. Of course, in English we use the term to distinguish the Asian style from the European and American styles.)
Unfortunately it is a scam - the animals were really imported British and Australian sheep shorn to look like poodles. The scandal was blown wide open when an actress on TV worried that her new dog didn't bark or eat dog food - it was revealed to be a sheep. Others wondered about the hooves instead of toes.
It appears that, in Japan, sheep and poodles are both rare enough for ordinary people to not have a great grasp of what the differences between ungulates and canines are. Many of the poor sheep have found homes on farms or zoos.
The ridiculous haircuts given to poodles actually are a carryover from their use as hunting dogs. Their coat is so thick they could drown if retrieving game in water - so hunters shaved some off. The fur that they left on was to keep the vital organs and joints warm in the cold water. Today the poor things just look silly.
Water and oil don't mix, so the fish can live happily and feed on the breading that falls through. Obviously they can't go near the super hot "surface".
Apparently this is a demonstration and not actually intended as a home for your goldfish. The point is that the water doesn't cause an explosion when in contact with the hot hot oil. But that's not as cool as the fish in the fryer.
Mizuta Tasogare and Kato Jado carve regular pencils, mostly without breaking the lead. The result are these thin little works of art that move, interlock, and fold up. Their website is available in both nihongo and english - be sure to check out their extraordinary gallery of brilliantly carved enpitsu.
Bonus for you today is Pete Goldlust's carved crayons, which were my computer background for many months.
Even better is the short interview at the end where he is still trying to chew and can't talk.
Yatta!
The BBC World Service conducted a survey this year about what countries are perceived as having the most positive and the most negative effects on the world. Sort of a global popularity contest in a way.
The overall worldwide results for most positive are:
- Canada
- Japan
- European Union
- Israel
- Iran
- United States
- North Korea
It's important to note that the ratings definitely varied around the world as could be expected: the Muslim world thought Iran was a slightly positive force and weren't fans of Israel, while China and South Korea aren't so hot on Japan - all are understandable in light of 20th century history.
But it does seem that the world universally loves them some Canada, so keep up the good work, neighbors!
It's a long-running joke (but also serious) in America that it's sometimes best to pretend to be Canadian when going abroad for both personal safety and to avoid certain awkward political conversations. I have heard that Canadians do not approve!
