Sylvanian Families

Sylvanian Families (森のゆかいな仲間たち　シルバニアファミリー) were created and released in Japan by Epoch in 1985, which uses the concept of dollhouses and animal creatures. When I was a kid, my sister loved this toy because the quality is very high.

The dolls skin is made by like suede so it is so smooth and very tender. I think you would like to rub the dolls and keep it in your hand. The furniture in the dollhouse is made with attention to detail. For example, if you open the cabinet under the faucet, you can see the pipes. 

These kind of things win the hearts and minds of the girls. You would get all bogged down in the world of Sylvanian Families. It is quite a popular toy in Russia now. In Canada and the USA, it lost the rights to the name Sylvanian Families. So Tomy who had been distributing the toys worldwide reintroduced the line under the new name "Calico Critters" in 1993. 

Thank you so much!

HondaJet

The founder of Honda, Soichiro Honda was always dreaming to make the aircraft. Honda's genes began to study small sized business jets in the late 1980s. They went through a lot of difficulties, and then they succeed to make HondaJet. 

HondaJet has a unique design. They decided to go with an unusual over-the-wing podded engine configuration. It allows for more space in the cabin and reduces drag at high speeds and the noise, and increases fuel efficiency. 
In September 2012, they got the aircraft design award 2012 from The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).

They are trying to make about 80 jets per year. The price is about $3.65 million US. We will be able to see this jet soon. I hope it can create a sensation in the aviation industry.

The Specifications

Performance
Maximum Cruise Speed @ FL300
420KTAS
Maximum Cruise Altitude
FL430
Rate of Climb
3990 ft / min
NBAA IFR Range (4 occupants)
1180 nm
Takeoff distance
<4000 ft
Landing distance
<3000 ft
Engines

Manufacturer / Model
GE Honda / HF120
Output (Uninstalled Thrust)
2050 lbf each 
derated from 2095 each
Bypass ratio
2.9

External Dimensions
Height
14.90 ft [4.54 m]
Wing Span
39.76 ft [12.12m]
Length
42.62 ft [12.99m]

Interior Cabin Dimensions
Height
4.80 ft [1.46 m]
Length
17.80 ft [5.43 m]
Width
5.00 ft [1.52 m]

External Baggage Space
Total
66 cubic ft
Within aft section
57 cubic ft
Within nose section
9 cubic ft
Configuration

Typical configuration
1 crew + 5 pax (2 crew + 4 pax)
Alternative configuration

1 crew + 6 pax (2 crew + 5 pax)

Thank you so much.

A brand-new camera from Sony

This is a brand-new camera from Sony. The model name is DSCWX10. I saw this camera on the internet a while ago and I actually could touch it and took a look of this camera's feature at Sony of Canada Ltd yesterday! This camera can attach to your cell phone like iPhone or Xperia. First of all, DSCWX10 connects to a cell phone through NFC (Near Field Communication). Once connect to each other through NFC, it connects through Wi-Fi. You can press a button on DSCWX10 or tap a button on your cell phone's screen to take a picture. It has a CMOS image sensor like Cyber-Shot so you can get a very clear picture even if you take a picture in the dark. The picture quality is much much better than the cell phone picture.

Actually, you don't have to connect to the cell phone, you can take a picture without the cell phone and save the data in a micro SD. The price is CAD 249.99. You will be able to see and buy this camera at Sony Store and Henry's (in Canada) in the end of this month. Sony still have an idea and a power to make something a great stuff like this camera. I hope they can keep making such a wonderful stuff for us.

Thank you so much for reading!

A Compass to Fulfillment

Kazuo Inamori has founded and led to global success two giant corporations, Kyocera and KDDI. Also he helped Japan Airlines in bankruptcy in 2010. He excellently could bring Japan Airlines back from the grave. 
He has his own philosophy and faith. That is a kind of very easy things to do but people forget or don't believe it. He tells us what the life is, why we are existing, what we should do for our life.

"The right things are right."
When you were a kid, your parents and your teachers told you like "don't do the bad things and don't lie". But when we became an adult, we forget the simple phrase and we just don't believe it. If we are the super honest, we might get the damage from the people who lie to you. We think like that. Of course we don't want to get the damage, so sometimes we are against to the right things. For example, this is a kind of small thing but we park a car on the street but the spot is not a right spot to park. We know we may not do that but we do. 

"The thoughts will become reality."
The author of "Think and Grow Rich", Napoleon Hill, the author of "The secret", Rhonda Byrne, they said the same things. Also Kazuo Inamori had a same experience in his life. If we think hard about something that we want to do, it will become reality. I actually agree with this. Our current life made by our thinking. If we want to do something, we think about it and we just do it. Our dreams come true.  

"After you."
It is an altruistic behavior. If you do a nice things to the other people, they will be a happy and be grateful to you and they will try to do a nice things to you. We can not live alone. We need the people's help. Think about the people and be nice to the people, the people will be a happy and you will be a happy.

Kazuo Inamori tells us those kind of things from his actual experiences. I hope you can get and read this book to have love and peace.
A Compass to Fulfillment: Passion and Spirituality in Life and Business

Thank you so much!

Epsilon-1

On August 27, JAXA was trying to launch the first Epsilon Launch Vehicle (Epsilon-1) with SPRINT-A on board from the Uchinoura Space Center in Japan. But An automatic stop alarm was issued as an attitude abnormality was detected about 19 seconds prior to the liftoff time during the automatic countdown sequence. It was a kind of sad moment for us.

The Epsilon Rocket is the next-generation solid propellant rocket. It can reduce the cost by a third of the cost for former rocket and we can check and control the rocket anywhere in the world simply by using a laptop computer! And the Epsilon Rocket has a brain. It can think and find what is the problems and if it found a problem, the Epsilon Rocket stop the launch by itself. So it needs just a couple of people for the launch. It is unbelievable.

Epsilon-1 detected an abnormal situation. That is way it stop the launch. This is not a failure. It showed us the ability of the judgement. The rocket is very smart.

And then, on September 14th, JAXA launched the Epsilon-1 with SPRINT-A at 14:00 (JST) from the space center! Yes! The satellite, SPRINT-A is currently in good health. The nickname is "HIsaki".  You can see the naming story is here.

From now on, the launch of the rocket will become much much easier which means that we can be much closer to space! I really want to go to space!

This article is not about a product which you can buy from us but this is one of the fantastic stuff from Japan. I just wanted let you know about the Epsilon-1. Thank you, Epsilon-1.

Thank you so much. 

Whisper of the Heart

"Whisper of the Heart (耳をすませば、Mimi o Sumaseba)", is a 1995 Japanese animated drama film directed by Yoshifumi Kondo and wrtten by Hayao Miyazaki besed on the 1989 manga of the same name by Aoi Hiiragi. Yoshifumi Kondo was a very important person in Studio Ghibli, Inc. Unfortunately, He passed away in 1998 at 47, 3 years later from this film. It was a first long film and only one film for him. The meaning of the tiltle is slightly different between the English title and the Japanese title. It is very difficult to translate. It is a subtle nuance between them. The meaning of Japanese title is not like the English title. It often happens that the meaning of the title is different between Japanese and English becuase some words or phrases are in Japan but the words and phrases are not in English. Hayao Kawai also (was a Japanese Jungian psychologist) said "We can not translate Shuntaro Tanikawa (a Japanese poet)'s poem "Mimi o Sumasu". "Mimi (耳)" means ear, and "Sumasu (澄ます)" means clarify so it's "Clarified ear". But the meaning is not like that. "Mimi o Sumasu" is like "listen". But it is not just listen. Maybe "listen carefully". But it sounds a little bit strong. The Japanese title is more thoughtful and calm. I would say "Listen to your heart" instead of "Whisper of the Heart". I think there is no English word like "Whisper" for Listen. Listen is just listen. It is very difficult. 

By the way, this movie is very thoughtful and warm. Shizuku Tsukishima is 14 years old girl who is a bookworm. One day, she found out Seiji Amasawa is reading same books at a library which she read already. There were his name on the check out cards of some books which she was trying to read. He is reading a book which she wants to read and she is reading a book which he wants to read. Shizuku is wondering "who is Seiji Amasawa". She got a feeling that she wants to meet him. This story is a kind of a love story but it is not only the love story. This movie is drawing the youthful dreams and their struggle and conflict for threir dreams and love. This movie makes us realize we should not forget the kind of time forever.

Whisper of the Heart

Hiroshi Yamauchi

Family Computer

Former Nitendo head Hiroshi Yamauchi passed away at 85. He made Nitendo as a worldwide company. 

In 1889, Nitendo was a playing cards (Hanafuda) company but they made the "Game and Watch" in 1980. We loved it so much when we were a kid. Everybody had one and we wanted keep it in our hands all the time like cell phone. In 1983, they made
"Family computer (Nentendo Entertainment System: NES)".

We played "Super Mario Bros". It was a sensational game for us. I think we played it every day, every time. My mom said to me, "you will be so stupid, so cut it out!". But I couldn't stop. I played like crazy. Mario was made by Shigeru Miyamoto.

Gunpei Yokoi helped Shigeru Miyamoto a lot. These two made today's
Nitendo with Hiroshi Yamauchi. I still love the Nitendo's products.
They brought a fantastic home entertainment to us. 

May he rest in peace.
Thank you so much, Mr. Yamauchi. 

Game & Watch

Kazuo Murakami

Did you know that the gene is not much different between human and chimpanzee? It is only 1.2% different! But the looks and almost everything are different between human and chimpanzee. Because some of the genes of human are ON but those genes are OFF in chimpanzee. The switching of genes makes the different. 

And there are good genes and bad genes. If we can turn ON the good genes, we can have a wonderful life. How can we turn ON the good genes? One of the way is the "laugh", Kazuo Murakami says. And also if you think everything negatively, you might turn ON the bad genes like you might have the cancer. The book is very interesting. I didn't know we can control our genes. Please read his book and turn ON and control your nice genes and have a wonderful life! 

You can buy his book from Amazon!
The Divine Code of Life: Awaken Your Genes and Discover Hidden Talents

Thank you so much!

Sony Cyber-Shot

There are so many Digital Camera companies and manufactures in the world. According to Wiki, the active camera brands are about 40 now, of which 11 are Japanese brands like Sony, Canon, Epson, Fujifilm, Nikon, Panasonic etc.

These Japanese electronics companies are falling down in the market because they have been besieged by competition from rivals in the U.S., South Korea. Their financial situation is very bad now. 

But still they are making the digital cameras because I think they still have not been lost their engineering passion and the quality of the products.

I have a iPhone 4s in my hand now. I use my iPhone to take some pictures often. And also I have sony's Cyber-shot. I have not used my Cyber-shot for a while because I have iphone and it very useful but when I compare the quality of the photos of iPhone and Cybershot, there is still big different between them. The quality of the photo of Cyber-shot is much much better than iPhone. Especially, I can see the different when I took a picture in the dark.

Apple knows the big different of the photo quality so they are using Sony's camera in iPhone 5 now.
Apple iPhone5 main camera is made by Sony

And there are so many electronic stuff in iPhone which is made by the Japanese electronics companies like Murata, TDK, Toshiba and Sharp etc. The iPhone can not exist without Japanese technology. 

I hope you can try to get and touch the Japanese technology. I am sure it is not dead. The era of Japanese electronics will be back soon. I believe it so.

Here is Cyber-shot T from Amazon!
Sony DSC-TX30/B 18 MP Digital Camera with 5x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3.3-Inch OLED (Black)

Thank you so much!

Koishikute

Haruki Murakami's new book "Koishikute (Ten selected love stories)"is now in Japan. The picture is from a japanese news paper. I have not read this book yet but it says he selected 9 love stories of the novelists like Maile Meloy, David Kranes, Tobias Wolff and Lauren Groff etc. And his own new love story is in the book! Of course this is a japanese book but I just wanted introduce his new book to all. 

Thank you so much!

Tamiya R/C Car

Tamiya is a Japanese manufacturer of plastic model kits, redio controlled cars, battery- and solar-powered educational models, sailboat models, acrylic and enamel model paints, and various modeling tools and supplies. 

The company was founded by Yoshio Tamiya in Shizuoka, Japan in 1946. Tamiya's product always catch people's hearts, especially kids. "Coro Coro Comic" is a comic magazine for kids. From 1983 to 1989, there was a radio control car story, "Radi Con Boy" in Coro Coro Comic. We loved "Radi Con Boy". Everybody wanted to have a RC Car because we were inspiered to have one by "Radi Con Boy". 

The main RC car in Radi Con Boy was "the Honet". Tamiya made that. When I read the comic, I wanted and wanted "the Honet" and do the same things in the comic book. 

I think I got it on my 10th birthday. I assembled it by myself. It was so much fan! When I tried to make it run in a park, I was so happy. It worked and it was so fast! I made a tiny bump and make it run over the bump. "The Honet" has the oil rear suspensions. The roll stability was so good. "The Honet" is the improved version of "The Glass Hopper". You can get it from below. I hope you can try to have it to know the high quality of Tamiya's work. 



Thank you so much!

Transformers

We think you know about Transformers. It is very famous in North America and all over the world. But did you know this toy is made by Japanese toy maker, Takara Tomy? The toy is very precise and very realistic. Some toys are very difficult to transform. But it is very awesome toy. You should try it!

You can buy Transformers from Amazon!
Thank you so much!

Parasite Eve

Parasite Eve is a Japanese science fiction novel by Hideaki Sena, first published in 1996 in Japan. I usually don't want to read and watch the horror stuff but I don't know why I read this book because I like science. 

Parasite Eve was adapted into a film, manga and video games. When Hideaki Sena was a graduated student in Tohoku Univversity, he wrote this novel. 

Mitochondria are the energy factories of biological cells. It has own independent genome againt human genome. It has been in the cells over hundred million years. It try to occupy the human being to take up initiative. It was so thrilling and scary story but very interesting. I want to introduce more books by Hideaki Sena.

Here is the book that you can buy from Amazon!
Parasite Eve

Thank you so much!

Sonic Colors

Sonic Colors is a 2010 platforming game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series. It is released by Sega for the Wii and Nitendo DS. I played this game on Wii. It is so much fun! It's soooo speedy and the graphics is so beautiful. Of special note is the high quality of the sound! The music is very fantastic and matched for all stages. Especially, I love the opening theme, "Reach for the Stars"! If you wait for a second and don't start after you insert the CD, you can listen the song. The music iand arranged by Tomoya Ohtani. The lyrics by Alex Makhlouf and Samuel Frisch. The vocals by Jean Paul Makhlouf. He is a big brother of Alex. Cash Cash is their band name. The music is sixteen to the bar. It is so fast. The lyrics is so awesome. I love it so much. You must play this game or listen this song! You have to move fast whenever you do something. I am always listening this song when I have to do the dishes! Here is the lyrics that I translated in Japanese! This song makes you feel more powerful. You have to make dreams a reality for your life!

Reach for the Stars

星にとどけ　（大きな夢をもとう）

音速で飛び立とう

眩しい光と色がそこら中にある

僕は勇ましく走り、早くそして自由に生きている

僕の心の中には後悔なんてない

後ろを振り向くな

あきらめるな

チャンスを逃がすな

僕は走り続ける！

星に必ず手がとどく

でもすごく遠くにあるけど

自分の道を進んで今日こそチャンスをつかもう

星空はとても眩しくて

色たちもぴったりあって

ただ僕の手をとればいい

一緒に星をつかもう

今夜

今夜

朝起きて日々を生きる

したいことをしてやりたいようにする

まさに僕の足元で世界が回っている

僕の心の中には後悔なんてない

後ろを振り向くな

あきらめるな

チャンスを逃がすな

僕は走り続ける！

星に必ず手がとどく

でもすごく遠くにあるけど

自分を信じて今日こそチャンスをつかもう

星空はとても眩しくて

色たちもぴったりあって

ただ僕の手をとればいい

一緒に星をつかもう

星はもう目の前だ

色たちもぴったりあっている

地面から足が離れた

僕は走り続ける！

よし、今なら感じる

色たちはそこら中にある

ただ僕の手をとればいい一緒に星をつかもう

チャンスをつかもう

僕らならまたうまくやれる

ただ僕の手をとればいい

今夜チャンスをつかもう

星に手が届く

今夜

今夜

Totoro

My Neighbor Totoro (Tonari no Totoro) is a Japanese animated fantasy film wrtten and directed by Hayao Miyazaki. Hayao Miyazaki is also a great Japanese director. He created so many fantastic anime like Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Princess Mononoke and Sprited Away etc. The story of all his films are very interesting. My Neighbor Totoro is the one. A university porfessor Tatsuo Kusakabe and his two daughters, Satsuki and Mei, move into an old house. Satsuki and Mei met the monsters but they are not scary monsters. I think they love kids and love to play with kids. I believe they are the fairy. If I can, I want to meet them too. The film is good for the kids! Unfortunetely, Hayao Miyazaki has announced that he decided to retire a couple days ago... We wish we can watch his movie more...

You can get "My Neighbor Totoro" from Amazon!

Thank you so much!

High and Low

"High and Low" is created by Akira Kurosawa. He is a great Japanese film director. The title in Japanese is "Heaven and Hell". One day, Kingo Gondo got a phone call from a guy. The guy said "I kidnaped your son." But his son, Jun was just playing outside. Jun was OK. The kidnapper mistook to kidnap. The boy was Shinichi, a son of Gondo's chauffeur... There is no way to pay the ransom for Shinichi because he is not Gondo's son. But what if the kidnapper killed Shinichi? Shinichi is a best friend of Jun. Gondo has to make a decision.

You can buy "High and Low" from Amazon!
High and Low (The Criterion Collection)

Thank you so much!

Tokyo 2020

Tokyo win for 2020 Olympic!! This is great for the victim of the earthquake! Ganbare Nippon!!

Thank you so much!

Power Ranger is made in Japan

Shotaro Ishinomori is a manga artist who wrote Goranger. Power rangers is coming from his Manga, Goranger. The goranger series is airing on TV from 1975 and it is still going on! When I was a kid, I love this rangers. Red, Bule, Green, Yellow, Pink! Red is a leader of them. Pink is only lady. The situation is now a little bit different but the concept of Ishinomori is still same.

You can buy Power Ranger from Amazon!

Thank you so much!

Buddha

Osamu Tezuka is a pioneer of manga in Japan. He wrote a lot of fantastic manga until he died of the cancer of the stomach.
One of his manga which I love very much is "Buddha". This story is based on the real story of Buddha. 
You will be able to know what the life is, what the human is, why we exist in the world and where God is. Our life are connected to everything even the small lives like the bugs and the flower.
It is easy to understand the Buddha's work. You should try to read this!!!

You can buy Buddha from Amazon!

Thank you so much!

Doraemon

Doraemon came from the future. His work is to help Nobita who can not make anything anytime.
Nobita asks Doraemon to make something well. But sometimes he tries to solve a problem by himself with his courage.
He is a boy who is actually very kind and taking care about his friends and he has the guts.
That is why Doraemon helps him with his full might. Doraemon has 4 dimension pocket which he can get the tools of the future. I really wanted get the tools when I was a kid. 

"Dokodemo Door" which we can go any place in a moment where we want to go.
"Takekoputer" which we can put a tiny helicopter on our head and fly anywhere.
I envy Nobita. Doraemon is very thoughtful, lovely and dependable. I wish if he can be with me now. 



Thank you so much!

Nerunerunerune

This is a fantastic Japanese candy. It calls "Nerunerunerune"! You put some special powder with some water in a container and mix them! That's it! The taste is very yummy and soft! More mix, the more delicious! Please try this fantastic product from Japan!

You can buy it from Amazon!
Popin' Cookin' DIY Nerunerunerune Candy Paste Soda Flavor by Kracie

Thank you so much!