Kamikaze images 2025 Nov 21    kamikazeimages.net

American and Japanese images of kamikaze pilots differ greatly. This web site explores diverse portrayals and perceptions of the young men who carried out special (suicide) attacks near the end of World War II.

When Japanese kamikaze pilots carried out their attacks between October 1944 and August 1945, Japanese and American people had opposite perspectives. Japanese people saw young smiling pilots as they waved goodbye. In contrast, American soldiers viewed death and destruction when the pilots' planes exploded upon crashing into their ships. These very different points of view continue to influence Japanese and American perceptions of kamikaze pilots even until today.

Fukushima’s umbilical cord 2025 Oct 10    amusingplanet.com
Linked is an Amusing Planet entry on Fukushima's bizarre umbilical cord border.

The borders of Fukushima, Niigata and Yamagata doesn’t meet at a tri-point as the zoomed-out map seems to suggest. Instead, you will see a very thin strip of land attached to Fukushima snaking into Niigata. This is called a salient. The Fukushima Prefecture salient —famously called the umbilical cord—extends about 8 km starting from the summit of Mount Mikuni, following the ridge of Mount Kengamine, passing through the summit of Mount Iide, and ending on the summit of Mount Onishi. At its narrowest, it is only about 35 inches across (90 centimetres).

The article explains how this came to be, which can be summed up as: the ridge of this mountain range is culturally important to Fukushima Prefecture, so much so that it was made to remain inside its borders even when the surrounding land was reassigned.

And the article has a map, but weirdly, no pictures of the mountaintop shrine in question. The one bland photo of the empty ridgeline they do have seems to be sourced from the Wikipedia article on the umbilical cord border, with the Wikipedia having no more photos or an article on the shrine itself. Or at least, the English Wikipedia doesn't. But the Japanese Wikipedia certainly does, along with many photos. Check it out for yourself, the shine so important it necessitated this strange salient.

10 Observations About Tokyo 2025 Apr 30    persuasion.community
I just got back from my first visit to Tokyo, staying in the city for only two brief days. This guy's observations from having lived there for six months (after 15 years in Montreal) match exactly what I just experienced myself, or at least the portion of the list I was exposed to in my short visit.