Bear sightings triple in northeast amid food shortage
News On Japan via Japan Times -- Jul 30
Bear sightings in the northeast more than tripled to 628 this spring as food became scarce, an Environment Ministry survey says.
As a result of heavy snow last winter, "the season for wild vegetables came about one to two months later than last year, and the bears may have approached human dwellings seeking food," an Aomori Prefecture official said.
The sightings in the six northern prefectures are about 3.3 times more than last year, the survey results released Saturday said.
A 24-year-old woman was in a serious condition Friday after being stabbed by a man whom she reported to police for stalking her in Kurashiki, Okayama Prefecture. (Japan Today )
China's television regulator has ordered a crackdown on dramas about the country's battles with Japan during and before World War Two and demanded they be more serious, state media said on Friday, following viewer complaints about ludicrous storylines. (Reuters )
Police said Friday they have found four dead bodies in an apartment in Kashiwa, Chiba Prefecture, in what is believed to have been a family murder-suicide. (Japan Today )
Shukan Post (May 24) conveys the difficulties experienced by other parts of the adult-entertainment biz in servicing customers from the communist nation.
A deri heru (“delivery health”) call-girl tells the tabloid that she is often requested to arrive at major hotels in the Shinjuku and Ikebukuro entertainment areas of Tokyo by Chinese visitors. (Tokyo Reporter)
Six sailors were found dead after a fire on a foreign freighter docked at a port in Hokkaido, northern Japan.
The sailors are presumed to be Russians. (NHK )