High (or Low) Technology; Blurring Naked Man

I saw "Naked and Afraid" on Discovery channel, which is adventuring TV program. People who are completely naked try to survive in a jungle in Colombia with only one civilized tool, for example a knife, being given to each participant.

They took off their clothing and left all their belongings behind when they entered the jungle. 

I was astonished by their survival skills. It freaked me out to imagine crawling nakedly in a bush that could have allergen inducing leaves or poisonous insects.

However, there's one more thing that surprised me. 

Due to the graphic nature of this program, it cannot be broadcasted without censoring graphic parts of the participants body. It amazed me how advanced their censoringship is.

As far as I know, this kind of censoring is very simple, a blur is put onto a specific part of the image.

Surprisingly, in the program, only the part of participant's body is censored, occasionally along with an object surrounding their body, such as branches or leaves. Their hands are always left uncensored.

I'm really curios how they process shadings on footage. It's easy to do that for a picture, but I'm not sure for a video.

Do they censor every single slide of the video?

Maybe there is software that processes it automatically?

It would likely be the latter one. It does seem to be manual operation, since some scenes have very rough blurs rather than smooth ones. 

It's unlikely that they would manually do it, but I cannot find another probable explanation.

Maybe it relies on outsourcing overseas.

Thanks to Laurel's revision.

Pangram; いろは歌 & A Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over the Lazy Dog

A quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

This is called a pangram, which is trying to make sentence by using every letter of the alphabet at least once. The fewer times same letters are used in it, the greater the pangram it will be. In the  previous sentence, A, E, O, U and R are used more than once.

There is a similar thing in Japan but the difference from a pangram is that you cannot use the same letter twice. Every Japanese knows Iroha Uta, the greatest one. The poem was written around the 10th or 11th century. It had been regarded as a work by a famous priest in the 8th century but apparently it was not.

いろはにほへと　ちりぬるを

わかよたれそ　　つねならむ

うゐのおくやま　けふこえて

あさきゆめみし　ゑいもせす

Did you find that every Japanese letter from あ to を is used exactly once in the poem?

It's written in ancient Japanese and include letters we don't use nowadays.

It might be a little hard to understand, so I'll try to show the meaning.

色は匂へど 散りぬるを

Although material things like flowers bloom, they perish.

我が世誰ぞ常ならむ

Nothing in the world stays the same.

有為の奥山 今日越えて

Deeds of human beings are a deep mountain, I'll hike over it now.

浅き夢見じ酔ひもせず

(The material world is vanity like a dream. People who don't know that are drunk).

I won't see the silly dream nor get drunk.

Maybe a few people know, there's another type of Iroha Uta. Though it was written just about 100 years ago, it's no longer famous. 

とりなくこゑす ゆめさませ

みよあけわたる ひんかしを

そらいろはえて おきつへに

ほふねむれゐぬ もやのうち

鳥啼く声す 夢覚ませ

I heard the song of birds, now it's time to wake up.

見よ明け渡る 東を

Look at the East side, which is becoming bright.

空色映えて 沖つ辺に

The sky reflecting in the open water is splendid.

帆船群れゐぬ 靄の中

There are sailing boats in the fog.

The former one was based on the Buddhism aspect and the author tried to squeeze spiritual concepts in the limited space he had but this one is just describing scenery. I think it still takes talent but it's not superior to the former one.

Thanks to MauricioEiji, Nancy, and Vanillaplant's correction.

Why Haven’t I Known South Asian Rock and Pop?

Do you listen to the music of how many countries?

By chance I found Singaporean music on the internet, and I was excited when I first listened to it.

I felt good influence from UK music on it, maybe because it's English speaking country.

https://www.noisesingapore.com/music-player?featured=2

I got the link from a website "Noise Singapore", an art and music festival there.

Despite the wealth of music on the internet, we tend to listen to music of our own countries and from specific countries such as the US and the UK. Aside from those, I know of only a few musicians from several other countries. Off the top of my head, for example, Iceland, France, Germany, Argentine, Nigeria, Cuba, Canada, Denmark, Spain but The Kings of Spain is from US, Korea, and Taiwan. 

Oh? I could list countries more than I expected.

However, I have listened to far fewer songs from each country compared to American, British and Japanese ones.

I sometimes pity that, although we already have great tools to overcome any distance, we are only introduced to limited music. I just want to listen good music regardless of nationality. As far as I know, recent South Asian music is never brought to Japan except in the very narrow avant-garde field.

Not only there is a lack of introduction, but also we tend to look for what is familiar to us.

The way to meet new music might be too narrow considering the variety of music in the world.

We need to venture outside our ways to chance encountering new music once in a while.

I'm glad to meet Singaporean music unexpectedly.

If each country has each music scene, we pass over a lot by sticking to music from specific countries.

Thanks to MauricioEiji's revision.

Passion to develop toilets

Japanese sanitary company's passion to develop toilet is outstanding in the world.

Our toilets have magnificent features, but unnecessary for some people, such as an automatic open rid system, an illumination light to help your aim at night, comfortable music, flushing sound in order to drown out some sound you create, a seat heater, and not to mention a spray-toilet.

You don't need to be worried about coldness by the water spray, of course it's a warm water. It is okay not to brace to get sprayed because you can adjust the force of the spray as you want.

That kind of toilet is quite capable to deodorize, toilet smell will be sucked in it like a vacuum.

For those of you who feel turning lever is really a hustle, they offer a remote controller. Nowadays it also served as a smartphone app. You can relieve if you forget to flush it!

I've been living for 30 years in Japan but it has been still a mystery for me to know who needed such functions. They always outstrip my imagination.

Apparently these features are very exclusive, I've almost never seen features above in overseas countries. 

Thanks Monique!

Travel in Japan: Kumano Kodo

Kumano Kodo, "Kodo" literally means "ancient road". The road is a convergent one, there are several starting points of the road but the destination is one, Kumano Shrine. The treks are lying on Kii Hanto Peninsula, mountainous area, about 3 hours south from Osaka by car.

The routes were formed about 1000 years ago. The shrine was quite popular and many Shintoist went through the routes despite its location.

However, nowadays the treks get attention not only from religious people but also for hikers due to its view and rocky road. I'm one of them, I trekked for 3 days. You can enjoy splendid scenery and fresh air in the heart of forest mountains.

Thanks Monique!

A Minor Complaint about Air Conditioners

There is a small thing about the remote of my air conditioner.

I'm worried about whether I can convey it correctly. It's such a small complaint I'm not sure you'll even understand it.

My question is: why can't the remote be synchronized with the main unit more easily.

Generally, the remote is handy. It lets me turn the AC up and down from a distance, set an off-timer and on-timer, and see the temperature setting.
However, when I use the remote, I have to point it towards the AC unit precisely. If the remote faces another direction, the signal travels the wrong way, and it doesn't work.
It happens especially when I use it while doing something else. The required angle to point it at the AC is like archery and I always have to shoot the second arrow.
Why does the signal last only for a moment?
Why can't control the AC on the first try?
If the signal lasted several seconds, not a moment, I wouldn't have to aim it so exactly. Moreover there should be a better way to sync it.
My previous AC had the same limited features, it never improves.

It's such a small issue that I feel awkward to bring it up, though.

Thanks to Brian, MauricioEiji and SY's correction.

Candylipz: Way to Make Your Lips Bigger

Candylipz.

It looks questionable but the development of these kind of beauty instruments never ends.

A lady put a squishy rubber apple-like stuff on her lip, and squashed it to absorb it into her lips. Afterwaiting a minute, voila! Her lips became plump and more attractive.

I found this interesting product, Candylipz, by chance.

I watched a demo video on Instagram and first thought "what's the difference?" but maybe it's just because I'm a guy who is not particular about lips. I could tell the difference by comparing between before and after. 

The application is simple and easy. I have no idea how popular it is, but it seems it was a hit in 2015. I didn't see it in Canada last year, though.

The appearance is neat enough to sell (perhaps) but I'm guessing it will be hard for it to become a big hit in Japan due to the difference in the sense of beauty in regards to lips.

It's interesting that this simple product is created after people invented lip injection to plump. It should be the opposite but I know sometimes it's tougher to create simple stuff. The simpler you make a product, the tougher it is to invent.

According to the official web page, lips will stay plumped for up to 2 hours. Users might use before going out...but how do they do after 2 hours?

Is her lip going to shrink while hanging out?

Anyway, I was somewhat impressed that there is still possibility to develop such a simple product.

Thanks to Dillon and CthuluFett's correction.

Hey guys, Do you polish rice?

I'll write about rice again, but this time the topic is more about rice itself.
Yesterday, I did rice polishing.
It occurred to me later that I didn't know whether or not this procedure existed abroad. Actually, I'm not sure what do they do about rice in other area of Japan, not to mention abroad.
In which condition do you buy rice, polished or unpolished? Furthermore, do people even know if rice needs polishing before you wash and cook it?
Oh no, doubts beget more doubts, I'm way too skeptical.
I know rice is everywhere and unpolished rice is not edible, so, for this reason, people polish rice everywhere. I shall not doubt.

Anyway, I went to a rice polishing facility with 30kg of rice. There are dozens of facilities like this in rural towns.

When you pour unpolished rice into a hopper and insert coins in the slot, rice is then sucked into a machine and polished automatically. After waiting several minutes, polished white rice comes from an outlet port. Then you have to bring 30kg of rice back home. 

It's laborious.

What is interesting is that you may not be able to find that such a normal thing exists, or doesn't exist, if you live in a different region. For example I couldn't imagine that people didn't have to polish rice.

Thanks to Dylan and Brian's correction.

You’ll succeed on the third attempt

There are only two ways to plug in, true or false.

But you'll succeed on the third attempt.

                                                  ―――――USB

Don't give up until your third try.

Recently I had to make a graduation speech in front of students at my ESL school's graduation ceremony.

At the end of the speech, I wanted to prepare something smart and funny but I was reluctant to cite others' aphorism so I decided to coin my own proverb-like saying.

Later on, when I was about to give it up before long and I was browsing 9GAG, I found something that hit the spot. Eureka!

That was the joke about USB. Then I added some encouraging words and remade it to pretend to be a real saying like above. I was supposed to be ready to say it.

Finally, when it came to mentioning the fake proverb in my graduation speech, I don't know whose fault it was, there was no laughter. They were so silent that I could hear their nods. It looked like that my sham saying was taken as a real maxim.

I really wondered whether I should let it pass as I pretended not to notice. However, I overcame the shame and tried to repeat it and explain it.

(I was seriously relieved that I didn't have to implement my aphorism, the third attempt.)

Luckily, some people laughed but if no one had laughed with even repetition, I wouldn't have gotten over the psychological shock.

Thanks to ReneeCole and CthuluFett’s revision.