Blaine has been quite busy in the past week covering President Obama's visits to Japan and, today, to South Korea.
Here are some of his stories, often with WashPost White House correspondent Anne Kornblut:
Hiroshima: The dreaded invitation
Obama declines offer to visit the bombed city on his first trip to East Asia
In Japan, Obama stresses Asia's role in U.S. economy
Obama, Japanese premier at odds over air station negotiations
Obama to discuss vexing N. Korean behavior with S. Korean leader
In Seoul, Obama will confront trade and security issues
Showing posts with label Japanese Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Japanese Politics. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Mystery treats at the konbini
One of the games I play in Japan is "mystery treat": At the konbini (convenience store), I buy random things without knowing exactly what's in them. I search the label for English clues, decipher Japanese hiragana when I can (like finding the word oishi, which means "delicious"), look for color clues (among soy milk boxes, for example, I've learned that yellow is banana flavored, pink is strawberry, green is green tea), and buy it anyway.
Sometimes it works, like when I found green-tea flavored milk or honey-flavored milk with tapioca in it. Sometimes it doesn't, like when I bought ume (sour plums).
Tonight I found an unusual ice-cream treat at our local AM/PM konbini. The only English was "White Taiyaki," and because it was in the ice-cream freezer, it seemed logical to guess that it would be a fish-shaped ice-cream dessert.
This is what it looked like inside: a palm-sized fish, very lightweight. The outside layer was made of very thin, styrofoam-y, edible wafer material.
I've seen fish-shaped treats lately at the grocery store, which led me to believe there were greater cultural forces at work in the design. I was right... Wikipedia tells me that a taiyaki is taiyaki is a "fish-shaped cake" that is usually filled with azuki (red bean) paste. I think they must also be an expression of autumn, because the Japanese love seasonal variations in food. Here's the taiyaki from Wikipedia.
I'm not a huge fan of azuki because it can be thick and bland; today's other "mystery treat" was azuki-bean-flavored soy milk that I bought for Lucinda. Not a big hit. So I took a bite and...
Delightful! Inside the fish, there is vanilla ice cream and a thin layer of sweet red bean jam.
So delicious that after Blaine finished writing about the new Japanese prime minister, he rode his bike to the konbini to get one, too.
Sometimes it works, like when I found green-tea flavored milk or honey-flavored milk with tapioca in it. Sometimes it doesn't, like when I bought ume (sour plums).
Tonight I found an unusual ice-cream treat at our local AM/PM konbini. The only English was "White Taiyaki," and because it was in the ice-cream freezer, it seemed logical to guess that it would be a fish-shaped ice-cream dessert.
This is what it looked like inside: a palm-sized fish, very lightweight. The outside layer was made of very thin, styrofoam-y, edible wafer material.
I've seen fish-shaped treats lately at the grocery store, which led me to believe there were greater cultural forces at work in the design. I was right... Wikipedia tells me that a taiyaki is taiyaki is a "fish-shaped cake" that is usually filled with azuki (red bean) paste. I think they must also be an expression of autumn, because the Japanese love seasonal variations in food. Here's the taiyaki from Wikipedia.
I'm not a huge fan of azuki because it can be thick and bland; today's other "mystery treat" was azuki-bean-flavored soy milk that I bought for Lucinda. Not a big hit. So I took a bite and...
Delightful! Inside the fish, there is vanilla ice cream and a thin layer of sweet red bean jam.
So delicious that after Blaine finished writing about the new Japanese prime minister, he rode his bike to the konbini to get one, too.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Blaine's latest... and Japan's big election
The Japanese rejected the Liberal Democratic Party after 54 yrs in power, and replaced it with the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).
The new ruling party brings some needed fresh faces and more women into the government. And to encourage child-bearing, the party has promised to make childcare much more widely available and to send monthly $250 checks to families for each child. (Turns out that we're eligible because we're also paying high Japanese taxes, so we won't complain.)
But do Japanese voters really want change? And is dramatic change really possible in this stable - and some might say ossified - society? Stay tuned. Should be interesting.
The new ruling party brings some needed fresh faces and more women into the government. And to encourage child-bearing, the party has promised to make childcare much more widely available and to send monthly $250 checks to families for each child. (Turns out that we're eligible because we're also paying high Japanese taxes, so we won't complain.)
But do Japanese voters really want change? And is dramatic change really possible in this stable - and some might say ossified - society? Stay tuned. Should be interesting.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Blaine's latest...
... is his second enterprise story from the Philippines, about the incredible shortage of doctors there because the vast majority leave the Philippines to make more money working as nurses in the US. End result: the proportion of Filipinos dying without medical attention is a stunning 70 percent.
Here's the video he did for the story. He was with the hospital's chief doctor during a power shortage, when he went to see an elderly man who'd died in his bed.
But that's not all! On Friday, Blaine had an unusually revealing interview with a top guy at Japan's central bank.
The banker was surprisingly open about Japan's dependence on the US economy and banking stability, saying, as Blaine put it, that Japan is "captive" to the US economy and had no choice but to do a $60 billion currency swap with the Federal Reserve.
Here's the video he did for the story. He was with the hospital's chief doctor during a power shortage, when he went to see an elderly man who'd died in his bed.
But that's not all! On Friday, Blaine had an unusually revealing interview with a top guy at Japan's central bank.
The banker was surprisingly open about Japan's dependence on the US economy and banking stability, saying, as Blaine put it, that Japan is "captive" to the US economy and had no choice but to do a $60 billion currency swap with the Federal Reserve.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Blaine's latest...
Blaine has been extraordinarily busy in the past 10 days. Lots of breaking news and ongoing developments for the WP's East Asia bureau, such as:
The global financial crisis.
The health of Kim Jong-il and N Korean nuclear policy.
The resignation of the Japanese PM.
The global financial crisis.
The health of Kim Jong-il and N Korean nuclear policy.
The resignation of the Japanese PM.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
