Foreign celebrities messages to Japan

Lady Gaga, the American singer arrived in Tokyo yesterday to promote a new album or perform a concert.

I’m not a fan of Lady Gaga. I’m not sure why she came here exactly. I wouldn’t have given her arrival here a second thought…until I saw what she did to her arm and purse.

Before her flight landed in Tokyo, Lady Gaga had someone (probably a Japanese passenger on the same flight) write on her arm and her white handbag (that was probably an expensive designer brand) in Japanese カタカナ (“katakana“) script.

And then she paraded through Japan’s Narita Airport showing off her bag with 「アイ　ラブ　スモール　モンスター　　東京ラブ」 (“I love small monster. Tokyo love“) written in black permanent marker on it, and her arm with 「アイ　ラブ　リトル　モンスター」 (“I love little monster“) written on it.

Whatever that’s supposed to mean!!

Many foreign celebrities come to Tokyo and show off tattoos, or T-shirts with Japanese writing.

“I love little monster” written on your arm or 「一番」 (“Number One“) on your T-shirt is just as ridiculous in Japanese in Japan as it is in English in a “western country”.

「一番」 ("Number one") T-shirt

Airplane crash

At 6:48AM JST this morning (Monday, March 23, 2009), a Federal Express (FedEx) cargo plane arriving at 成田空港 (Narita (Tokyo Int’l) Airport) from Guangzhou, China crashed and burst into flames.

Image from TV of the plane crash in Japan's Narita Airport.

This was a cargo plane, so there were no passengers on this airplane…only the American pilot and co-pilot were onboard. They both died.

Just like yesterday, it is very windy in the Tokyo area today. At the time of the crash, the wind was blowing up to 72Km / hour (about 45 miles / hour).
The wind is being blamed for causing the airplane to bounce on the runway and burst into flames.

Here is a YouTube video of the news report showing the tragedy:

Some news

• Air India flight 307 left 成田空港 (Narita Airport in Chiba (near Tokyo)) for India on Sunday, 21 September 2008 but had to return to Narita because parts of the engine fell off…and struck two parked cars near the airport.One piece of debris sliced through the wind-shield of a car like butter. Luckily noone was hurt.
• The American Navy’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, U.S.S. George Washington, is scheduled to arrive in Japan tomorrow to commence being homeported in 横須賀 (Yokosuka (south of Tokyo)).A large number of protesters are expected to greet the ship because many Japanese are against having a nuclear-powered or nuclear-armed ship even visit Japan, not to mention being stationed here.

  

• On Monday, 22 September 2008 (two days after his 68th birthday), 麻生太郎 (Tarou ASOU) was chosen to be the new Prime Minister of Japan.

  

  (My post about the former Prime Minister, 福田康夫 (Yasuo FUKUDA), resigning on Sept 1st is here).