Random Japan

Robotic dancing troupe World Order kicks off the new baseball season with seven-man pitch 【Video】

KK Miller

Springtime means one thing for sports fans: baseball! While Major League Baseball is still toiling away in spring training and pre-season games, the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) league has already kicked off their season with the first games occurring at the end of March.

Since spring signals the time for new beginnings, what is more precious than the beginning of the first home game of the year? And with it brings the first opening pitch of the season. For the 2013 Japan Series winners, the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles, they asked Genki Sudo and his group World Order to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.

But how do you ask seven people to throw out one ball?

The Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles are the pride of baseball in the northeastern Japan, with fans in six prefectures. Their championship win two years ago was extra special as it was their first title since their inception in 2005, and no doubt acted as a huge pick-up-me following the events of 2011. While their results last season were less than stellar (they came in last place…), they hope to rebound with the help and inspiration of World Order.

5.17 million Number of commuters who could be stranded in downtown Tokyo in the aftermath of a major quake

50,000 Size of the security force that will be deployed during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics

4,991,900 Estimated sales of new cars and trucks in Japan in fiscal 2015, the first time in four years the number is expected to drop below 5 million

RIDING THE RAILS

• Officials at JR West have unveiled a successor to their much-loved Twilight Express sleeper train, which was decommissioned last month after a quarter-century of service.
• The new train, dubbed Twilight Express Mizukaze, features open-air observation decks and guestrooms with bathtubs. It will go into service in early 2017.
• Government seismologists hope that a network of cables being laid off the coasts of northern and eastern Japan will help speed up tsunami detection times by as much as 20 minutes. The cables are attached to “gauges and other observation devices.”
• Staff at the Japan Documentary Film Preservation Center say they’ve acquired three movies featuring previously unseen footage of the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. The films total about 15 minutes in length.

What's That Scooter Best Used For?
Purse Snatching 

Uber
Skids Out Of Japan

Disaster expo shows innovations in thriving industry

By ELAINE KURTENBACH

NATIONAL APR. 05, 2015 - 06:20AM JST

Mankind is powerless to prevent calamities such as typhoons and earthquakes, but in Japan where the devastating 2011 tsunami still looms large, there’s a flourishing industry in devising ways to cope with catastrophe.

Some of the products on display at an exhibition on the sidelines of a recent United Nations disaster conference in the northeastern city of Sendai featured high-tech innovations and new materials. But many were just inventive, practical solutions for challenges such as quickly getting people out of harm’s way.

Products like Masayoshi Nakamura’s “Jinriki” — custom-made handles designed for easily hustling wheelchairs over debris and up hills. “I just wanted to do something to help,” said Nakamura, jumping into a wheelchair as he urged a visitor to give it a try.