Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on December 2012

HOLD YOUR TONGUE

• A survey of 500 married people found that the thing Japanese women most try to avoid telling their husbands is, “Earn more money.”
• Meanwhile, men try to avoid telling their wives, “Clean the house better.”
• Popular NHK newscaster Takeshige Morimoto was arrested for groping a woman on the Den-en-toshi line, although he says he was drunk and doesn’t “remember touching her body.”
• Researchers at Iwate Medical University say the number of local residents being treated for high blood pressure has skyrocketed since the March 11 earthquake.

THE NATURAL WORLD

• Officials at the environment ministry are concerned about the proliferation of poisonous redback spiders, an invasive species from Australia that’s now found in 23 prefectures.
• The Cabinet Office has adopted the view that anyone getting hit by a 1-meter-high tsunami will be killed 100 percent of the time.
• Japanese officials hope to begin importing 10 percent of the country’s rare earth metals from India next year thanks to a new “memorandum of understanding” signed between the two nations.
• A 28-year-old pianist from Miyazaki took third prize at the International Music Competition in Geneva. She wowed the judges with her performance of Schuman’s concerto for piano and orchestra in A minor.

BAD BOYS

• A 56-year-old riot cop with the Metropolitan Police Department resigned after it was discovered that he stole ¥2.75 million from a common fund and spent the money on dating websites.
• Another riot officer in Chiba was arrested for “abduction with obscene intent” after stopping a 17-year-old girl on the street and taking her to a hotel as part of a nonexistent “investigation.”
• The captain of a Taiwanese fishing boat detained by the coast guard admitted that his crew caught 7,000kg of sanma while in Japan’s exclusive economic zone.
• Four people in Chiba were arrested for posing as celebrities—including members of AKB48—in an attempt to get users to join a bogus dating website. The scam netted “around ¥210 million from 2,166 people.”

LOST CAUSES

• A 72-year-old man with a bullet wound to the head was found dead in a park in Yokohama.
• The justice ministry says the recidivism rate of Japanese criminals in 2011 was 43.8 percent—the highest on record.
• Officials at Tokyo Tower announced that the number of visitors to the facility is off by about 450,000 in the six months since Tokyo Skytree opened.
• The health ministry says that, for the 18th consecutive year, the number of hospitals with pediatrics and obstetrics departments has dropped.

HELPING HANDS

• An international association in the Western Tokyo city of Hachioji has created multilingual cards “to assist foreigners in finding evacuation sites in case of disaster.”
• The industry ministry says Japan, China and South Korea will begin negotiations early next year on a trilateral free trade agreement.
• The transport ministry upbraided new discount airline Jetstar for entrusting the safety of its aircraft to inexperienced mechanics—the first time the ministry has taken such an action against an air carrier.
• Bottom Story of the Week: “Donated Sewing Machines Help Disaster Evacuees Pick Up the Threads” (via The Mainichi)

Compiled from reports by AP, Japan Today, The Japan Times, Jiji, The Tokyo Reporter, Japan Probe, The Mainichi, Daily Yomiuri, AFP, Reuters and Kyodo