Suspect Koizumi "Sent a Letter" to Father, His Phone Call After 10 Years of Silence

**Hi kids, this is the first in (hopefully) a series of my own, personal English translations of Japanese newspaper articles. Feedback is appreciated.**

Asahi Shimbun
November 23, 2008

In his family home in Yanai City, Yamaguchi Prefecture on the 23rd, the 77-year-old father of suspect Tsuyoshi Koizumi, unable to hide his shock, said "Even though my son hated violence. I saw the subtitles (on television) and thought, my God, I hope this is a mistake."

According to Koizumi's father, even though he had no communication with his son for ten years, Koizumi called and talked with his father on the 22nd from 4:30-5:00 p.m., saying "I sent you a letter. It'll probably arrive tomorrow. Please read it." At the time, the father thought the letter might be a wedding announcement. But once he had seen the evening news broadcast, and no one answered his call to Koizumi's Saitama-City home, the father said he began to think his son was the one being held at the police station.

Regarding the doubt around his son's participation in the repeated attacks on the home of the Vice Minister of Welfare Ministry, Koizumi's father said, "I didn't think he would do this kind of thing. I want to tell him, 'kill yourself' because he snatched away two precious lives. I'm extremely sorry."

Link to Japanese Article
**P.S. I hope this isn't illegal in any way.**

These Are a Few of my Favorite Things

I recently moved to the southernmost edge of the Maple Leaf neighborhood. As well as being a refreshingly residential area, it has a surprising number of animals. Let me show you just a few of them:

My roommate's ridiculously cute rats. The one on top is named Beers, the other is mini Beers.


The cat that stalks through our yard and stares into my bedroom. I suspect he came in once too. I found dirty paw-prints.


The spider that protects my tomatoes. His web forces me to pick very carefully.


A hummingbird that visited today. My parents spotted one last weekend, in a yard a couple blocks from here. I take their presence as a good sign.

Cute Photo from Yesterday II

Columbia City Farmers Market, Girl watching bellydancers, around 6p.m, September 3.

Cute Photo of the Day (that day being yesterday)

Shot on the second floor of Bauhaus on Capitol Hill around 3p.m, September 2.

Random Bits and Pieces

Search for "qurdity" in Google, and you'll probably find around 292 results. Stop, don't go look it up in the dictionary—it's not a word.

It appears that, for many results, the actual PDF displays "quality," but the text Google displays as a result mis-scans the word as "qurdity."However, if you restrict your results to only PDFs, Google finds 119 results, and a search for "qurdity" and "pdf" returns 275 results.

The University Community Urban Center Plan actually displays the word "qurdity" in the PDF, but it seems that the originally scanned text has been replaced by a digital version, so it may reflect the same problem I proposed initially.

Curious.

Just for fun, see if it makes sense to replace "qurdity" with "quality" in the follow excerpts from search results:

• Proposed Water Qurdity Standards For Interstate and intrastate Streams in New Mexico
• enhance the qurdity of renewable resources

And here's one that has many more problems:

• blending sites qn site infrastructure, water resources, air qurdity and noise, socioeconomic resources,. waste management, public and occupationrd health

But what's really puzzling is why a scanner picks up one "quality" but not the other, as shown here:

• Currently, the definitions for Quality, Qurdity Assurance...

SHHHHH! Secret Bumbershoot Entry

So I'm here writing to you from the Bumbershoot Press Room in the Alki Room, tucked way in the corner of the Seattle Center. I'm using the Onereel intern's Apple to boot. I feel so illicit. I am here volunteering as the Media Room Assistant, which means I get a walkie-talkie, staff badge, staff shirt, and achy feet.

But never mind that minor discomfort, the real value is in the access. It's amazing to be able to walk backstage almost anywhere and schmooze with stage managers, sound guys, and if you're lucky, artists. The one place we can't get backstage is the Samsung Mobile Mainstage. In fact, I'm almost bored of being "backstage" because it means either that the band isn't playing to you, you're busy doing something, or you have to keep an eye on the clock. Then again, when I'm not attending a concert, I stay dutifully in the Press Room and restock and clean the free grub table all the members of the media chow at.

Bananas are quite popular, as well as York Peppermint Patties and Clif Bars. Oh, and never have I seen bagels disappear quite like this. And the given, coffee.

It seems like many of the journalists are eating breakfast, lunch and dinner off of that table. It makes me think that writing must really pay badly. At least the photographers occasionally wandered in with some booth food.


Just a block and a half from Bumbershoot, Moxie's Backyard Barbeque dished out pulled-pork sandwiches on a folding table. At first the woman running the stand joked that pictures would be $5, but then let me take some. As I walked away in my official-looking Bumbershoot staff T-shirt and Walkie-Talkie, she wondered out loud if she would "get in trouble." If she only knew how little power I actually had.

These impressions are just a backdrop for the real attraction: the bands. Though I've been tied to the smallest stage all day,I've enjoyed the Wells Fargo Stage—though I thought I'd be doomed to kids music and polka.





A young father reads the Bumbershoot lineup with his daughter (right) next to the Wells Fargo Stage during the Matt Jorgenson set (left).












Yesterday the stage was all jazz, all the time but the sets were different enough to fend off monotony. One thing did stay the same, though: crowd demographics. Middle-aged couples, young parents, and the elderly sat and smiled pleasantly, looking like they hadn't felt so relaxed in months.

The Whigs play their second set of the day at the Rockstar stage.

The Whigs were another story all together. They rocked the tiny Music Lounge in midafternoon like they were on a megastage, but KEXP DJs broadcast the event from a table onstage and lucky fans sat mere feet away, only a few feet away from them and the beads of sweat flying off the three musicians. Lead singer Parker Gispert sprang around the stage, a performance style that Sons and Daughters later mocked backstage at The Whig's 6p.m. concert at the Rockstar Stage. Despite the thrashing, Gispert hit every cue at both sets and the band ran like a well-oiled, rock machine.

Glasgow-based Sons and Daughters wait for their set and watch The Whigs perform at the Rockstar Stage.

Sons and Daughters charmed the crowd with their Scottish accents and touristy awe after The Whigs (they were so excited to be playing next to the Space Needle). Lead singer monopolized the stage presence with her bright blue and gold outfit, long jet-black hair, and emotive croons and shrieks. Their songs were usually some variation of a simple, slightly funky riff with stylized vocals and occasional bursts of speedy percussion.

The band came off stage nine minutes early, but someone in the crowd caught on and started an "encore" chant, which succeeded after the Stage Manager went out and encouraged the timid crowd.

And so ended my 12 hours of volunteering, but I still had to get to Capitol Hill to get my credit card from a bar I went to on Friday night. (I was unable to do earlier because of a charming English accent and some photo lessons—don't ask).

Here are some sound clips from my journey up Pike and along Broadway. Can you guess where each was recorded?

1. The bar
2. A store
3. An intersection


Last but not least, here I am after about 16 hours on my feet, away from my comfy bed:

That Other International Sports Competition

The final celebrations of an international athletic contest filled with drama, sportsmanship, and record-breaking were held right in the Hagget Dorm on the University of Washington campus last night.

Teams from as far away as Switzerland, Japan, and Australia and representing more than 10 different countries, celebrated after five days of competition in the World Boomerang Championship, organized by the International Federation of Boomerang Associations.

During the competition, the teams left their dorm rooms early every morning to return, exhausted, in the evening from a long day of throwing at the fields next to the Intramural Activities Building. Both Team and individual competitions were held.

Though the boomerang may be better know for its recreational or hunting uses, the IFBA Web site explains just how intensely athletic it can be as well. Take the Team Endurance Relay as an example:

Each thrower sprints 20 meters to the bullseye of a circle. Throw and catch a boom as many times as possible for one minute. Sprint back and tag the next teammate.
- IFBA Web site

Winners took their trophies yesterday evening, with the German team B-motions taking first place in team competition, followed by Americans Rad Revolution in second place and the Swiss Team Skandal in third.

The dorms stairs and elevators filled with a mix of languages as the revelers made their way to a ively and alcohol-infused party in the third-floor lobby of Hagget Dorm's North Tower.

The lobby itself was permeated with a feeling of success and the smell of beer as people mingled and joked.


Everyone seemed to be holding some sort of brightly colored award—the "default" awards after the real ceremony—explained Arnaut, a member of one of the French teams.


Almost no one wore their own team's shirt, and a few people seemed very intent on getting everyone's signatures on their World Championship T-shirts.


Peter Hansch, 38 (left), came with one of the three German teams and won the "1988-2008 Vacation from Boomerang Award" for coming back after 20 years away from the sport. Hansch said that he played for one year but then quit in 1988 because other things got in the way.

He's glad to be back now, he said, and he likes the the Boomerang community because, even though it is small , it is also tight-knit. Most throwers also make boomerangs, and recently, only the children of well-established throwers and returning throwers have been joining, so the sport is not really growing, explained Hansch.

The Italian team, Young and Old, were a perfect example of this trend with a 57-year age difference between the the youngest, 13-year-old Alessandro Scarpellino (pictured right, far right), and its oldest member, 70-year old Valentino De Chiara (second to left). Alessandro came with his father, Antonio Scarpellino (third from the left).


The IFBA was also well represented, with President Maurizio Saba and Treasurer Andrea Sgattoni (far left and second from right) also participated.

Several times the noisy room quieted to hear happy announcements, like one young woman's birthday, and also to watch a young man's team initiation ceremony (pictured left).


Today, the teams are scheduled to attempt to beat world records at Greenlake until 6p.m.


They will return home August 27 and 28, after a solid 10 days of boomerang, and will have to wait until the 2010 World Championships to compete again.


To find out more about competitive boomerang or to view videos and information about the 2008 World Championship, visit: http://seattle2008.ifba-online.com/smf/